Chiang Mai, Thailand — When Myanmar’s junta announced a conscription law to help crush a popular pro-democracy uprising, Khaing knew there was only one way to escape its clutches and she began planning her escape.

Weeks later the former teacher was hidden in a smuggler’s van heading into Thailand with little more than some clothes, cash and an ID card, not knowing when she would be able to return.

Now scraping a living in Bangkok without papers, Khaing worries constantly about a tap on the shoulder by Thai police and deportation back to the junta.

She is one of tens of thousands of young people rights groups estimate have fled Myanmar since the military introduced conscription in February to shore up its depleted ranks.

The junta is battling widespread armed opposition to its 2021 coup and its soldiers are accused of bloody rampages and using air and artillery strikes to punish civilian communities.

It says it wants to enlist 5,000 new people, each month, aged between 18-35, but details on how they will be chosen, and where and how they will serve are vague.

Media reports of young men being dragged off the streets and into the army, which the military denies,have further added to the panic.

“The conscription law means we have to kill each other,” said Wai Yan, 26, from eastern Karen state, who in May crossed into Thailand.

“We are not fighting a war against foreign enemies,” he said from the Bangkok restaurant where he works without documents.

“We are fighting each other.”

Smuggled for $220

Shortly after enacting the law, the junta tightened requirements for people crossing Myanmar’s land borders, and temporarily halted issuing foreign work permits for young men.

Yangon-based film critic Ngwe Yan Thun, a pseudonym, said he had “no choice” but to leave illegally.

Through friends he contacted a “broker” who said he could be smuggled over the border into Thailand for around $220.

Ngwe Yan Thun sold off all of his belongings, arranged for friends to look after his dog and bought an air ticket to Tachileik on the Thai border.

At the airport, he had to pay “tea money” to officials at the airport who were suspicious of why he was traveling to the remote provincial town.  

He was dropped at a safehouse near the border where around 30 others were waiting to be taken into Thailand.

Then, at short notice, he was crammed into a car with 11 others and they set off.

“I didn’t feel like a human being, I felt like I was black market goods,” Ngwe Yan Thun said from Thailand’s Chiang Mai.

‘Am I in Myanmar?’

Thailand has long been home to a sizeable Myanmar community, with a bustling market in Bangkok and towns along the border.

The conflict has made it difficult to conduct surveys or verify how many young people had fled abroad to escape conscription, said an official from the International Labour Organization.

But the organization said it had received estimates from ground sources that suggested “hundreds of thousands” had fled the law.

Wai Yan said he was surprised at how many people from Myanmar were in Thailand.

“I even joke with my friends ‘Am I still in Myanmar?'”

‘Cried every day’

After arriving in Bangkok, Khaing was unable to contact her parents as fighting around her home village cut internet and mobile networks.

“I was worried about getting caught by the Thai police. So, I didn’t dare to go outside when I arrived,” she told AFP.

“I cried every day in my first month here.”

She found part-time work at a friend’s shop and returns in the evenings to her sparse room where she sells medicine and beauty products on TikTok.

A large teddy bear gifted to her by a friend who knew she was feeling lonely takes up much of the bed.

The first batch of conscripts finished their training and would soon be sent to their posts, state media reported last week, as fighting rages in the west and north of the country.

Ngwe Yan Thun is grateful he is far away, but is kept up at night wondering what to do next.

“I think about what I should do if I don’t get a job and official documents to stay,” he said.

“I can’t go back to Myanmar. I feel overwhelmed by thoughts and worries all the time.”
…

washington — The United States’ commitment to providing extended deterrence to South Korea is being put to the test, with some South Korean politicians publicly questioning the effectiveness of the U.S. nuclear umbrella after Russia and North Korea reached a new defense pact.

Debate over the U.S. extended deterrence was sparked by Representative Na Kyung Won, a five-term lawmaker of South Korea’s ruling People Power Party, who is running for the party leadership.

“The deterrence under the solid South Korea-U.S. alliance is currently working, but it does not guarantee the capacity to respond to the future changes in the security environment,” Na said in a social media post last week.

“The international situation, such as cooperation between North Korea and Russia, is adding uncertainty to the security of South Korea,” she added, referring to the stronger military ties between Russia and North Korea, bolstered by the comprehensive strategic partnership treaty signed by Russia’s President Vladmir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Pyongyang last month.

The new treaty mandates Russia and North Korea to immediately assist each other militarily if either of them is attacked by a third country. The prospect of quasi-automatic Russian involvement in any future war between the two Koreas is now causing alarm in Seoul.

The credibility of extended deterrence is a frequent topic of conversation in today’s South Korea, where citizens must contend with seemingly endless threats and provocations from the North. 

Seoul is doing its best to allay citizens’ fears by invoking the April 2023 Washington Declaration, which reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to defend South Korea through its extended nuclear umbrella as well as robust missile defense and conventional forces. 

The Washington Declaration outlined a series of measures, including the establishment of the bilateral Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG), to deter North Korea’s use of nuclear weapons. 

In the joint declaration, the U.S. additionally vowed to enhance the visibility of its strategic assets, such as a nuclear-armed submarine, around the Korean Peninsula.

The Washington Declaration’s measures are collectively sufficient to deter aggression from Pyongyang, according to some experts in the U.S.

The joint declaration was “unprecedented in its strength and clarity,” Evans Revere, a former State Department official who negotiated with North Korea, told VOA’s Korean Service on Sunday. “And the NCG process is designed to be flexible, creative, and allow for adaptation to a broad range of future contingencies.”

Troop presence

David Maxwell, a former U.S. Special Forces colonel who served on the Combined Forces Command of the U.S and South Korea, told VOA’s Korean Service on Sunday that a large troop presence on the Korean Peninsula demonstrates Washington’s firm commitment to the defense of its key ally.

“How many Russian troops are committed to North Korea? There is no comparison as to the commitment,” said Maxwell, who now serves as vice president of the Center for Asia Pacific Strategy.

Currently, the U.S. has about 28,500 service members deployed in South Korea.

In contrast, Elbridge Colby, who served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development in the Trump administration, suggested the U.S. might have to go beyond the Washington Declaration to ensure the security of South Korea.

“I think we need to take very seriously how dire the threat from North Korea is, and that the Washington Declaration is not a solution,” Colby told VOA’s Korean Service on the phone last week.  

“It’s been a failure that both North Korea and China are a nuclear breakout. They’re increasing the size and the sophistication of the nuclear forces. So it’s very unsurprising that serious people in South Korea are coming to this conclusion.” 

Bruce Bennett, senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation, believes some South Koreans may lack confidence in the Washington Declaration because the NCG’s work is not made public.

“Because the NCG that it established has carried out most of its work in secrecy and provided little substance to reassure the South Korean people, many of the South Koreans with whom I have spoken are concerned that it is an inadequate means for rebuilding South Korean trust,” Bennett told VOA’s Korean Service on Sunday.

Responding to an inquiry from VOA’s Korean Service, a State Department spokesperson said Thursday that “the U.S. and the ROK are enhancing and strengthening extended deterrence through the Nuclear Consultative Group, established as part of the Washington Declaration.”

The spokesperson also stressed that the Washington Declaration is “a landmark U.S. extended deterrence commitment to the Republic of Korea.” The Republic of Korea is South Korea’s official name.

Earlier last week, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell maintained that the series of mechanisms put in place between the United States and South Korea through the Washington Declaration “has given us what we need to work with” regarding the alliance’s deterrence posture.

North Korea launched two short-range ballistic missiles Monday, one of which is presumed to have failed and fallen inland near Pyongyang. The latest missile test came just five days after North Korea conducted a ballistic missile test in which it claimed to have successfully tested its multiple-warhead missile technology. South Korean authorities have dismissed such a claim.

Eunjung Cho contributed to this report.  
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Jakarta, Indonesia — Indonesian President-elect Prabowo Subianto has undergone leg surgery but is continuing to work as he recovers, a spokesman said Tuesday.

The defense minister and former general, who had suffered for years from a limp attributed to parachuting accidents, underwent surgery on his left leg at the National Defense Central Hospital in Jakarta, his team said.

Specifics of the procedure were kept under wraps, but Prabowo, who succeeds President Joko Widodo in October, described the surgery as “full of risks” in a social media post.

He has since resumed his duties as defense minister and was in attendance at an anniversary celebration for Indonesian police on Monday, Prabowo spokesman Dahnil Anzar Simanjuntak told AFP.

“Thank God, he is now very fit. [His leg] has healed and is much better now,” Dahnil said.

Pictures shared to both men’s official Instagram accounts on Sunday showed the president, popularly known as Jokowi, visiting a bathrobe-clad Prabowo while he was still in the hospital.

“I was aware and understood that the medical procedure I was undergoing was full of risks and my life was at stake,” Prabowo wrote in his accompanying caption.

The former general has courted controversy for past allegations of human rights abuses, accused by rights groups of a role in disappearing democracy activists at the end of dictator Suharto’s rule in the late 1990s.

But the fiery populist secured an easy election win on the back of his pledge to continue Jokowi’s popular agenda of strong economic development and his choice of the president’s eldest son Gibran as his vice president.
…

doha, qatar — The third round of U.N.-led talks to explore engagement with Afghanistan ended Monday without the Taliban making any reform pledges or winning concessions from the international community.

A few international organizations and special envoys for Afghanistan from nearly two dozen countries met with Taliban officials in Doha, Qatar, over two days. Rosemary DiCarlo, U.N. undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, who presided over the event, told reporters the talks were “constructive” and “useful.”

“This is the first time such a broad cross section of the international community and the de facto authorities have had the opportunity to hold such detailed discussions,” DiCarlo said at the news conference after the event. “The discussions were frank and, I believe, useful.”

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres initiated the “Doha process” a year ago.

While participants in the latest round of talks agreed to continue to engage, DiCarlo ruled out recognizing the de facto regime in Kabul unless the Taliban ended curbs on women’s education and participation in public life.

Individual decisions

“Afghanistan cannot return to the international fold, or fully develop economically and socially, if it is deprived of the contributions and potential of half its population,” the U.N. official said, adding that recognizing Taliban rule is also not the mandate of the global body but would be the decision of individual countries.

Although nearly 16 countries have embassies in Afghanistan, the global community has held back recognition of the Taliban government mainly because it is not inclusive and restricts the rights of women and girls in the country.

Though women’s rights were not part of the official agenda, DiCarlo said participants raised the issue throughout their discussions and highlighted the need for an inclusive government during the two-day talks that focused on developing a private business sector and helping the Taliban sustain anti-narcotics gains.

“Afghanistan’s messages reached all participant countries,” Taliban delegation head Zabihullah Mujahid said in a post on social media platform X after the talks, adding that his country needed international cooperation.

Speaking to VOA on background, a Western diplomat said the Afghan delegation members were “very competent” and their technical know-how was “impressive.”

Earlier, in a post on X, Mujahid, who is also the Taliban’s chief spokesperson, claimed success.

“It was pledged that restriction on banking and economic avenues should be lifted,” the post said.

While more than a hundred Taliban members face international sanctions, including financial sanctions, Afghanistan’s banks do not. Experts say the country is disconnected from the global banking system and the dominant SWIFT financial transaction network because Western banks are wary of doing business with Afghan banks and exposing themselves to the reputational and financial risks they pose.

No new policy was introduced by any country, the Western diplomat privy to the talks said.

Separately, the U.S. froze $9.5 billion in Afghan central bank funds after the Taliban took control of the country in August 2021. In 2022, the Biden administration put $3.5 billion of that money in a Switzerland-based trust account called “Fund for the Afghan People,” which a board oversees. The remaining money remains locked. China, Russia, Pakistan and Iran are among countries that support unfreezing the funds.

‘It was about understanding’

Speaking to reporters late Monday, Mujahid said the Taliban did not come expecting a breakthrough.

“It [the gathering] was about understanding each other’s views,” Mujahid said in response to a VOA question on the lack of progress on contentious issues between the Taliban and the West. “The achievement is that every country wants to support Afghanistan.”

The U.N. is under fire from rights activists for its decision to exclude Afghan civil society activists to ensure the Taliban’s participation in the global meeting. DiCarlo told reporters it was “a very tough, maybe impossible choice.”

“We have a mandate to support this process [of talks]. Our belief was to bring the de facto authorities and special envoys together for direct talks,” DiCarlo said. “Regrettably, the de facto authorities will not sit across the table with Afghan civil society in this format.”

When asked what concessions the global body would be willing to make in the future to bring the Taliban back to the table, DiCarlo said she could not predict what conditions the de facto rulers might place.

“I could not speculate on that. What I can say is that they did come today. They were very engaged,” she said.

At least three prominent Afghan women have declined the U.N.’s invitation to meet for talks in Doha on Tuesday.

“I respect their decision,” DiCarlo said. “We’re involved in a process now that is going to be a long-term process. This is not easy going forward. And we will continue to try to do the best we can. We won’t make everybody happy.”

Asked whether the Taliban would come back for more talks, Mujahid said it would depend on who and what were on the table.

“We will consider each meeting separately,” he said. ” We will look at its agenda and targets.”

No date has been set for the next round of U.N.-led talks on Afghanistan.
…

islamabad — A group of independent experts from the United Nations demanded Monday the immediate and unconditional release of Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan, asserting that his imprisonment is arbitrary and violates international laws.

The Geneva-based Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which reports to the U.N. Human Rights Council, published the opinion, saying that Pakistani authorities have “no legal basis” for Khan’s detention.

The five-member group pointed out that the imprisonment of the 71-year-old former Pakistani leader violated at least a dozen articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“The Working Group requests the government of Pakistan to take the steps necessary to remedy the situation of Mr. Khan without delay and bring it into conformity with the relevant international norms,” it said.

Khan was convicted and sentenced to three years in August 2023 for alleged corrupt practices after a trial that he and independent legal experts declared replete with due process violations. Three days later, the Election Commission of Pakistan disqualified him from running for office for five years.

The conviction was related to his alleged failure to report and disclose gifts received during his time as prime minister in the so-called Toshakhana case. Toshakhana — which literally means “treasure house” — is a government department where gifts received by Pakistani leaders during foreign state visits are stored and displayed.

The U.N. group determined that the prosecution was not grounded in law from the outset, and that Khan’s unlawful detention “appears to have been intended to disqualify him from running for political office.”

The opinion was dated March 25 but made public only Monday. The experts concluded that “the appropriate remedy would be to release Mr. Khan immediately and accord him an enforceable right to compensation and other reparations.”

Khan, a philanthropist, politician and former cricket star, has been in jail since last August. He served as the prime minister of Pakistan from 2018 to April 2022, when an opposition-led parliamentary no-confidence vote ousted him from power.

Pakistani authorities, allegedly acting on behalf of the country’s powerful military, have filed numerous lawsuits against the ousted leader, accusing him of murder, sedition, graft and other crimes.

Khan denies the allegations as frivolous and an attempt to keep him from power. He is the head of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI, rated as the most popular political party in the South Asian nation of about 245 million people.

The experts noted that they had reached out to the Pakistani government through regular communication procedures to clarify the legal provisions justifying Khan’s detention and its compatibility with the state’s obligations under relevant international treaties.

“The working group regrets that it did not receive a response from the government to the present communication,” they stated.

Pakistani officials did not immediately respond to the U.N. findings.

The U.N. panel has the authority to investigate and issue legal opinions about alleged cases of arbitrarily imposed deprivation of liberty. Its opinions are not legally binding, but they hold significant reputational weight.

Khan’s party hailed the group’s conclusions and renewed its demand for Khan’s immediate release.

“The international silence has finally broken on the illegal incarceration of Imran Khan,” said Zulfi Bukhari, adviser to Khan and a PTI spokesperson.

“The international condemnation of the manner in which the government of Pakistan illegally stripped Mr. Khan of his freedom and rights has echoed from the U.S. to the U.N. … and now the Working Group [is] shining a light on it as a blatant effort to interfere with his intentions to run for political office,” Bukhari stated.

In the lead-up to Pakistan’s February 2024 general elections, PTI candidates were arrested, tortured and intimidated into leaving the party. Authorities blocked and disrupted PTI campaign rallies, and the party was deprived of its iconic cricket bat symbol in a controversial move, forcing its candidates to run as independents.

Just days before the February 8 election, Khan was convicted in three more cases and sentenced to an additional 10 years, 14 years and seven years, respectively. He blamed the military for the crackdown on his party and vote manipulations and mobile phone and internet shutdowns on election day — charges the election commission and the military denied.

Despite the restrictions, independents aligned with PTI won the most directly elected seats, 92, but were short of a simple majority needed to form the government.

Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 368-7 to urge a “full and independent investigation of claims of interference or irregularities” in Pakistan’s election.

Islamabad rejected the probe call as an interference in the country’s internal affairs, saying the U.S. congressional resolution stemmed from “an incomplete understanding of the political situation and electoral process” in Pakistan.
…

…

NEW DELHI — India replaced colonial-era criminal laws with new legislation on Monday, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government said would make the country more just, but the opposition said risked throwing the criminal justice system into disarray.

The new laws were approved by parliament in December in Modi’s previous term with the government saying they aim to “give justice, not punishment.” It says they were needed as colonial laws had been at the core of the criminal justice system for more than a century.

Among the key changes is replacement of the sedition law frequently used as a tool of suppression, after its enactment under British colonial rule to jail Indian freedom fighters.

Under the new laws — which replace the Indian Penal Code, the Indian Evidence Act, and Code of Criminal Procedure — sedition is replaced with a section on acts seen as “endangering the sovereignty, unity, and integrity of India.”

“About 77 years after independence, our criminal justice system is becoming completely indigenous and will run on Indian ethos,” India’s Home [interior] Minister Amit Shah told reporters. “Instead of punishment, there will now be justice.”

Criminal cases registered under the repealed laws before Monday will continue to follow them, Shah said, adding that the first case logged under the new law was that of a motorcycle theft in the central city of Gwalior, registered 10 minutes after midnight.

“The laws were debated for three months … It is not fair to give political color to this big improvement happening after centuries. I ask the opposition parties to support this legislation,” Shah said.

Opposition Congress party lawmaker P. Chidambaram said the previous parliament session did not hold any “worthwhile debate” before passing the laws.

He said that there was only marginal improvement in the new laws, which could have been introduced as amendments to existing laws.

“The initial impact will be to throw the administration of criminal justice into disarray,” he posted on X.

The Indian Express newspaper said in an editorial that criminal justice reform should not be “a one-time solution or one that just takes place in the books,” and called for police reform and addressing gaps in judicial infrastructure.
…

FUJIYOSHIDA — Park rangers on Japan’s sacred Mount Fuji officially started this year’s climbing season about 90 minutes before sunrise on Monday, levying new trail fees and limiting hiker numbers to curb overcrowding.

At 3 a.m., officials opened a newly installed gate at a station placed just over halfway up the 3,776-meter (12,388-ft) peak that is a symbol of Japan and a magnet for tourists, now swarming into the country at a record pace.

Climbers must pay 2,000 yen ($12) and their numbers will be limited to 4,000 a day after complaints of litter, pollution, and dangerously crowded trails flowed in last year.

“I think Mount Fuji will be very happy if everyone is more conscious about the environment and things like taking rubbish home with them,” said Sachiko Kan, 61, who was one of about 1,200 hikers gathered on the first day of the new measures.

The yen’s slide to a 38-year low has made Japan an irresistible bargain for overseas visitors.

They are injecting record sums into national coffers but are also putting strains on facilities for travel and hospitality, not to mention the patience of locals.

Hordes of tourists became a traffic hazard at a nearby photography spot where Mount Fuji appeared to float over a convenience store, driving officials to put up a barrier of black mesh to obstruct the view that had gone viral online.

The climbing season this year on Mount Fuji, which straddles the prefectures of Yamanashi and Shizuoka about 136 km (85 miles) from Tokyo, runs until September 10, after which the weather gets too cold and snowy.

A still active stratovolcano whose last eruption was in 1707, Mount Fuji has been a site of Shinto and Buddhist worship for centuries. 

The number of climbers recovered to pre-pandemic levels last year, with about 300,000 annually, the environment ministry says. Hikers typically start in the wee hours to make it to the top in time for sunrise.

For their money, climbers receive a wristband giving access to the trail between 3 a.m. and 4 p.m, excluding those with reservations for mountain huts closer to the peak, to whom the daily limit on visitors will not apply, authorities say.

The new trail curbs were necessary to prevent accidents and incidents of altitude sickness, particularly among foreign “bullet climbers”, or those racing to the top, Yamanashi governor Kotaro Nagasaki said last month.

Japan should focus on attracting “higher spending visitors” over sheer numbers of people, he told a press conference.

Geoffrey Kula, one overseas climber waiting to scale Mount Fuji on opening day, took the restrictions in stride. 

“This is not Disneyland,” said Kula, a visitor from Boston. “Having some sort of access control system to limit the amount of potential chaos is good.” 
…

…

Islamabad — A United Nations-led two-day conference of special envoys for Afghanistan from nearly two dozen countries kicked off Sunday in Qatar with the Taliban demanding an end to financial sanctions and expressing a desire for greater engagement with the West while dismissing curbs on women’s freedom as a policy difference.  

This is the first time the Taliban participated in the gathering to discuss international engagement with Afghanistan since U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres initiated what is commonly referred to as the “Doha process” a year ago.  

Rosemary DiCarlo, U.N. undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs is presiding over the talks.

Delegates attending the conference told VOA, the hard-line group’s participation was a boon for the process, despite intense criticism from women’s rights groups in and outside Afghanistan for excluding rights activists. To ensure the Taliban did not skip the meeting as they did in February because activists were invited, the U.N. decided not to bring them to the official event. 

The Taliban were not invited to the first round in May last year.

Taliban’s pitch

Zabihullah Mujahid, chief spokesperson of the Taliban’s interim government, is leading the Kabul delegation. Addressing the gathering, Mujahid urged unfreezing Afghan funds and lifting banking sanctions that have cut off the country from the international financial system, saying such actions were hindering the economic progress his government was aiming for.

“Afghans are questioning why the easing of sanctions on financial and trade sectors remains slow-paced? Why the government and the private sector are consistently confronting various challenges?” Mujahid asked the gathering that included representatives from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

The U.S. froze $7 billion of Afghan central bank funds after the Taliban took control of the country in August 2021. In 2022, the Biden administration put half the money in a Switzerland-based trust account called “Fund for the Afghan People,” which a board oversees. The remaining money is locked in the U.S.

The Taliban delegation head did not directly reference the ban on girls’ education and women’s employment in most sectors, or curbs on their mobility, instead hinting at them as cultural, religious and policy differences. In a recent report, U.N. special rapporteur Richard Bennet called the Taliban’s hard-line practices an “attack on the entire civilian population, amounting to crimes against humanity.”

“I do not deny that some countries may have problems with some measures of the Islamic Emirate,” Mujahid said using the title the regime uses for itself.  

“The policy differences should not escalate to the extent that powerful countries use their leverage to impose security, political, and economic pressures on our people, affecting the lives of our nation in a significant way,” Mujahid added, apparently criticizing the way the United States and other western countries have been pressuring the Taliban to soften their stance. Mujahid instead called on countries to separate “Afghanistan’s internal matters from foreign relations.”

Referring to growing bilateral engagement with Russia, China, and others, Mujahid said the de facto rulers were keen to engage with the West.

“We hope that Western countries will also prioritize mutual bilateral interests in a similar manner,” he said.  

Prior to the start of formal talks Sunday, the Taliban held bilateral meetings with delegates from Russia, Saudi Arabia, India and Uzbekistan. While no country has recognized the Taliban government since the group came to power in August 2021 at the end of the 20-year, U.S.-led war, at least 16 countries have diplomatic missions in Afghanistan. Only Beijing has exchanged ambassadors with Kabul. 

Response to Taliban

“Everyone stated their position. It was good. Everyone talked about engagement,” Asif Durrani, Pakistan’s special representative for Afghanistan told media covering the summit. “The very fact that Taliban attended shows the U.N. could prevail.”

Despite severe criticism by global rights group of the U.N.’s decision to exclude Afghan women from the event and their issues from the agenda, no country boycotted the gathering. Delegates from the United States, Canada, Norway, and other western countries as well as the European Union are taking part in the talks along with representatives of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.  

“There is pressure to attend. There is a realization to make the best of it, to build on it,” said a Western diplomat speaking on background to VOA.  

They added that it was good that countries were choosing a structured process to deal with the Taliban and that despite nearly three years of Taliban rule, there was still a huge divide between the de facto rulers and the global community.

Speaking to media on the sidelines, Durrani said delegates raised the issue of women’s rights during the closed-door speeches. The Taliban gave measured, “palatable” responses to issues that were difficult for them, he added.  

Despite participants expressing concerns about the presence of terrorist groups on Afghan soil and calling out the regime for its treatment of women and girls, Mujahid seemed upbeat afterward.  

“The views of all countries seems positive about Afghanistan,” Mujahid said responding to a VOA question while talking to the media. “Because everyone wants to cooperate with Afghanistan. Which is good. We want to boost our relations with the countries which are already in touch with us, and those who aren’t, they should come and give importance to interacting with Afghanistan and cooperate with the people of Afghanistan.”

More than one delegate told VOA the mood during the talks was good and a positive tone was set for similar engagement in the future.

Discussions on improving conditions for Afghanistan’s private business sector, including exploring ways to collaborate on entrepreneurship, job creation, Islamic finance, and access to markets will take place Monday. This will be followed by talks regarding sustaining the Taliban’s ban on opium poppy cultivation, it’s impact on women, and providing alternative livelihoods to poppy farmers.

U.N. representatives and delegates from various countries plan to meet with Afghan civil society activists after the conference Tuesday. In a post on social media platform X, the Taliban foreign ministry official Zakir Jalali insisted this meeting would not mean the Taliban will be sharing the spotlight.

“If several special envoys meet with someone after the meeting of the participants, it has nothing to do with Doha-3,” he said.
…

Seoul, South Korea — North Korea launched at least one short-range ballistic missile off its east coast Monday, South Korea’s military said, a day after the North vowed “offensive and overwhelming” responses to a new U.S. military drill with South Korea and Japan.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missile was launched from North Korea’s southeastern town of Jangyon at 5:05 a.m. It said an additional, unidentified ballistic missile launch trajectory was detected 10 minutes later, a suggestion that North Korea might have performed two missile launches.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff said South Korea’s military has boosted its surveillance posture and is closely exchanging related information with the United States and Japan.

The launch came two days after South Korea, the U.S. and Japan ended their new multidomain trilateral drills in the region. In recent years, the three countries have been expanding their trilateral security partnership to better cope with North Korea’s evolving nuclear threats and China’s increasing assertiveness in the region.

The “Freedom Edge” drill was meant to increase the sophistication of previous exercises with simultaneous air and naval drills geared toward improving joint ballistic-missile defense, anti-submarine warfare, surveillance and other skills and capabilities. The three-day drill involved a U.S. aircraft carrier as well as destroyers, fighter jets and helicopters from the three countries.

On Sunday, North Korea’s Foreign Ministry issued a lengthy statement strongly denouncing the “Freedom Edge” drill, calling it an Asian version of NATO. It said the drill openly destroyed the security environment on the Korean Peninsula and contained a U.S. intention to lay siege to China and exert pressure on Russia.

The statement said North Korea will “firmly defend the sovereignty, security and interests of the state and peace in the region through offensive and overwhelming countermeasures.”

Monday’s launch was the North’s first weapons firing in five days. On Wednesday, North Korea launched what it called a multiwarhead missile in the first known launch of a developmental, advanced weapon meant to defeat U.S. and South Korean missile defenses. North Korea said the launch was successful, but South Korea dismissed the North’s claim as deception to cover up a failed launch.

In recent weeks, North Korea has also floated numerous trash-carrying balloons toward South Korea in what it has described as a tit-for-tat response to South Korean activists sending political leaflets via their own balloons. South Korea responded by briefly resuming its anti-Pyongyang front-line propaganda broadcasts for the first time in years.

In mid-June, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin struck a deal vowing mutual defense assistance if either is attacked. Observers say the pact could embolden Kim to launch more provocations at South Korea. The U.S., South Korea and others believe Pyongyang has been supplying conventional weapons to Russia for its war against Ukraine in return for military and economic assistance.

Meanwhile, North Korea opened a key ruling party meeting Friday to determine what it called “important, immediate issues” related to works to further enhance Korean-style socialism. On the meeting’s second day, North Korea’s leader spoke about “some deviations obstructing” efforts to improve the country’s economic status and unspecified important tasks for resolving immediate policy issues, North Korea’s state media reported Sunday.
…

Beijing — Beijing Tianbing Technology Company said Sunday that the first stage of its Tianlong-3 rocket under development had detached from its launch pad during a test due to structural failure and landed in a hilly area of the city of Gongyi in central China.

There were no reports of casualties after an initial investigation, Beijing Tianbing, also known as Space Pioneer, said in a statement on its official WeChat account.

Parts of the rocket stage were scattered within a “safe area” but caused a local fire, according to a separate statement by the Gongyi emergency management bureau.

The fire has since been extinguished and no one has been hurt, the bureau said.

The two-stage Tianlong-3 (“Sky Dragon 3”) is a partly reusable rocket under development by Space Pioneer, one of a small group of private-sector rocket makers that have grown rapidly over the past five years.

Falling rocket debris in China after launches is not unheard of, but it is very rare for part of a rocket under development to make an unplanned flight out of its test site and crash.

According to Space Pioneer, the first stage of the Tianlong-3 ignited normally during a hot test but later detached from the test bench due to structural failure and landed in hilly areas 1.5 km (0.9 mile) away.

A rocket can consist of several stages, with the first, or lowest, stage igniting and propelling the rocket upward upon its launch.

When the fuel is exhausted, the first stage falls off, and the second stage ignites, keeping the rocket in propulsion. Some rockets have third stages.

Space Pioneer says the performance of Tianlong-3 is comparable to SpaceX’s Falcon 9, which is also a two-stage rocket.

In April 2023, Space Pioneer launched a kerosene-oxygen rocket, the Tianlong-2, becoming the first private Chinese firm to send a liquid-propellant rocket into space.

Chinese commercial space companies have rushed into the sector since 2014 when private investment in the industry was allowed by the state.

Many started making satellites while others including Space Pioneer, focused on developing reusable rockets that can significantly cut mission costs.

The test sites of such companies can be found along China’s coastal areas, located by the sea due to safety reasons.

But some are also sited deep in the country’s interior such as Space Pioneer’s test center in Gongyi, a city of 800,000 people in the central province of Henan.
…

Islamabad — Pakistan said Sunday that discussions with the International Monetary Fund to secure a new multibillion-dollar loan program are progressing well and the program “is on track.”

Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb confirmed during a news conference that Islamabad is negotiating a three-year loan program valued at $6 – $8 billion to avoid a debt default. 

He stated that the government is pursuing the loan facility to sustain macroeconomic and currency stability, increase foreign exchange reserves, and attract foreign direct investment to cash-strapped Pakistan.

“The IMF program is our assurance in terms of macroeconomic stability. We are taking it forward certainly; it is inevitable… without this program, we cannot move forward,” he said.

“We are making positive progress. We are very optimistic that we will be able to take it through the finishing line for an Extended Fund Program, which is going to be larger and longer in nature,” the minister said of his ongoing talks with the U.S.-based global lender. 

Aurangzeb underlined the importance of the IMF loan, saying it would help unlock investments from other international financial institutions and countries that are friendly toward Pakistan, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. “They want a backstop for investment, which is the Fund program.”

Last week, Pakistan’s parliament passed the government’s tax-laden budget for the coming fiscal year. Officials claimed the budget would guide the country towards an era of sustainable and inclusive growth. Opposition parties rejected the budget, saying it would be highly inflationary.

Pakistan is facing $25 billion in external debt payments in the coming fiscal year starting in July, a significantly higher amount than its current level of foreign exchange reserves.

US support crucial

Aurangzeb, speaking Sunday, dismissed concerns that a recent resolution in the U.S. Congress calling for a probe into fraud allegations in Pakistan’s February elections would undermine the ongoing talks with the IMF.

Washington’s support is crucial for Islamabad to negotiate the bailout package successfully.

On Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 368-7, urging “the full and independent investigation of claims of interference or irregularities” in the February 8 vote.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s administration promptly rejected the resolution on Wednesday, saying it “stems from an incomplete understanding of the political situation and electoral process” in Pakistan. 

On Friday, ruling coalition lawmakers passed a counter-resolution in the legislative lower house of parliament, decrying the congressional move as an “interference” in Pakistan’s internal affairs. 

The opposition party of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan and independent observers have persistently alleged that the powerful military was behind widespread rigging, including mobile phone and internet shutdowns on polling day, and unusually delayed results to help its favored political parties to win the elections, charges Pakistan’s election commission denied.   

The contentious election has fueled political turmoil in the country of about 250 million people, making it harder for the Sharif administration to tackle the economic crisis and attract much-needed foreign investment.

Since gaining independence in 1947, Pakistan has received 23 bailout packages from the IMF, the most of any country in the world. Critics blame repeated military-led dictatorial rules, financial mismanagement, and corruption by elected governments for hindering democratic and economic progress.
…

New Delhi — The death toll from this week’s sudden heavy rain has climbed to 11 in New Delhi, including four citizens who drowned in submerged underpasses, the Times of India reported, while flight operations stuttered in the Indian capital.  

New Delhi, which endured one of its worst heatwaves in history earlier this month, faced the biggest downpour in decades on June 28, with rainfall in a single day surpassing the city’s average for the entire month.  

The torrential rain caused a fatal roof collapse at one of the three terminals of Delhi’s main airport, disrupted flights, flooded underpasses, and led to massive traffic jams, power and water outages in parts of the city.  

Nearly 60 flights were cancelled from New Delhi’s main airport in the last 24 hours, according to data from flight tracking platform Flightaware.  

Operations were largely normal on Sunday, with most flights from the affected terminal diverted to the other two, an airport official said but did not rule out possible flight cancellations in the course of the day.  

The Delhi airport is one of the country’s biggest and busiest.  

Terminal 1, the now-closed terminal, is mostly used by low-cost carriers IndiGo, operated by Interglobe Aviation INGL.NS, and SpiceJet, and currently has a capacity to handle 40 million passengers annually.  

An Indigo spokesperson did not comment on the flight cancellations and a SpiceJet spokesperson did not immediately respond to a phone call. 
…

…

NEW DELHI — The Nigerian student only popped out to repair his phone, but he ended up in a New Delhi hospital, the latest victim of a brutal heat wave that has cost scores of lives, sent birds plummeting from the sky and tormented India’s poorest workers.

On that sweltering June day, the business administration student collapsed in the street and strangers rushed him to the nearby Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) hospital, one of the country’s largest.

When he was admitted, his body temperature had soared to more than 41 degrees Celsius and he was very dehydrated, said Seema Wasnik, head of RML’s emergency medicine department.

She immediately recognized the classic signs of heatstroke. More than 40,000 suspected heatstroke cases were recorded in India as a prolonged heat wave pushed temperatures above 40 C on most days since May, with some areas hitting peaks of nearly 50 C.

The young Nigerian was lucky. The RML hospital is equipped with one of India’s first specialist heatstroke units, and doctors immersed him in an ice bath for 20 minutes to lower his temperature before moving him onto a ventilator.

His case was startling but not unusual – more than 30 patients have been treated in the unit since it opened in early May and five of those have died.

Heatstroke is caused when the body’s core temperature goes above 40.6 C. It can lead to long-term organ damage and death, and symptoms include rapid breathing, confusion or seizures, and nausea.

The specialist unit at the RML hospital is equipped with ceramic bathtubs where patients can be cooled, along with ventilators and huge ice machines. Wasnik said the hospital’s director decided to open the unit after seeing that meteorologists were predicting an extremely hot summer.

“We hoped that once we set the precedent other (hospitals) would follow,” she said.

And they did, spurred to action also by health ministry instructions to prepare for the prolonged and deadly heat waves being forecast by weather experts.

As well as Delhi’s RML hospital, a heatstroke unit was also opened in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Bhubaneswar in Odisha state. These are the leading national hospitals in the country.

Across India several other hospitals reserved beds and laid on extra staff to deal with heatstroke patients.

“The attention now being given to the problem signals a commitment to act,” said Srinath Reddy, an honorary distinguished professor associated with the Public Health Foundation of India, a health policy think tank.

“There is now no scope for apathy and no excuse for inertia as the climate emergency is scorching its signature on human bodies,” he said.

‘Heat trap’ cities

Across Asia, billions of people were exposed this summer to deadly temperatures for days on end with scientists attributing the intensity and duration of these heat waves to human-driven climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions.

So far this summer, from March to June, at least 110 people have died from heat-related illnesses in India, including scores of election workers during the recent vote. Northwest and eastern India recorded more than twice the usual number of heat wave days.

Hot winds during the day and relentlessly high temperatures at night meant there was no relief, and the agony was intensified for millions of the country’s poorest citizens by water shortages and power cuts.

Authorities described cities as “heat traps.”

And even as scattered rains began in late June, heralding the beginning of the monsoon season, Reddy said public pressure for more action to mitigate the effects of future heat waves would grow.

“There is now an anxious public’s demand for an effective government response and acceptance by pressured policymakers of the need to act with alacrity for protecting lives,” said Reddy.

Doctors from RML and AIIMS, Bhubaneswar told the Thomson Reuters Foundation that more than 90% of the patients they treated for heat-related conditions were outdoor workers, including security guards, migrant laborers and street vendors.

“Extreme heat aggravates existing income and health inequities,” said Hisham Mundol, chief adviser at the Environmental Defense Fund, India.

The poorest were unable to adjust their lifestyles to seek shelter from the heat by, for example, taking time off work, and also could not afford air conditioning, Mundol said.

They were also more likely to seek help at crowded public hospitals, where services were under immense strain because of the number of heat-related cases.

The extent of the problem was revealed in a nationwide survey of over 12,000 people across 20 states and union territories by the Centre for Rapid Insights (CRI), which showed that 45% of the households surveyed said at least one person fell ill from the heat in May.

Of those affected, more than 67% had family members who were sick for more than five days, and the poorest people were hit particularly hard, the survey showed.

Dillip Kumar Parida, medical superintendent at AIIMS, Bhubaneswar, said his institute had also opened a critical care unit for heatstroke patients but more needed to be done to keep pace with the effects of runaway global warming.

“The health system will have to prepare for that and stay ready so we are not caught by surprise like we were during COVID,” he said.

“Fighting with Mother Nature is impossible; we can only predict, prepare and spread awareness to deal with what is to come in the future,” he said.
…

JAMMU, India — The putrid smell of burning garbage wafts for miles from the landfill on the outskirts of Jammu in a potentially toxic miasma fed by the plastics, industrial, medical and other waste generated by a city of some 740,000 people. But a handful of waste pickers ignore both the fumes and suffocating heat to sort through the rubbish, seeking anything they can sell to earn at best the equivalent of $4 a day.

“If we don’t do this, we don’t get any food to eat,” said 65-year-old Usmaan Shekh. “We try to take a break for a few minutes when it gets too hot, but mostly we just continue till we can’t.”

Shekh and his family are among the estimated 1.5 million to 4 million people who scratch out a living searching through India’s waste — and climate change is making a hazardous job more dangerous than ever. In Jammu, a northern Indian city in the Himalayan foothills, temperatures this summer have regularly topped 43 degrees Celsius.

At least one person who died in northern India’s recent heat wave was identified as a garbage picker.

The landfills themselves seethe internally as garbage decomposes, and the rising heat of summer speeds and intensifies the process. That increases emissions of gases such as methane and carbon dioxide that are dangerous to breathe. And almost all landfill fires come in summer, experts say, and can burn for days.

At the Jammu landfill, small fires dotted the massive pile, sending up plumes of smoke as two men hauled a frayed tarp loaded with garbage on the day Associated Press journalists visited. A 6-year-old boy clutched an armful of plastic sandals. As other pickers occasionally sheltered from the heat, birds wheeled overhead, occasionally touched down in their own search for scraps.

India generates at least 62 million tons of waste annually, according to federal government records, and some of its landfills are literal mountains of garbage, like the Ghaziabad landfill outside New Delhi. And while a 2016 law made it mandatory to segregate waste so that hazardous material doesn’t make its way to landfills, the law has been poorly enforced, adding to the risk of waste pickers.

“Since they mostly just use their hands, they are already contaminated by touching everything from diapers to diabetes syringes,” said Bharati Chaturvedi, founder of the New Delhi-based Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group.

Chaturvedi, who has worked with waste pickers for more than two decades, said extreme heat has added new risks to waste pickers who are already victims of social discrimination and appalling work conditions.

“It’s been a terrible, terrible, terrible year,” she said. “They already expect to suffer from the heat and that gives them a lot of anxiety, because they don’t know if they’ll make it, if they’ll survive it (the summer).”

Chaturvedi said this year’s heat has “been the most catastrophic thing one could imagine” adding that “It’s really very sad to look at how the poor are trying to live somehow, just take their bodies and try to reach the end of this heat wave in some form of being intact.”

Heat planning and public health experts say that people who are forced to work outdoors are at most risk due to prolonged heat exposure. Heatstroke, cardiovascular diseases and chronic kidney diseases are some of the risks from working outdoors during high heat.

Waste pickers “are among the most vulnerable and highly exposed to heat,” said Abhiyant Tiwari, who leads the climate resilience team at the Natural Resources Defense Council’s India program.

In New Delhi, some people who work the capital city’s estimated 4.2 million annual tons of garbage have cut back from two meals a day to just one, said Ruksana Begum, a 41-year-old waste picker at the Bhalswa landfill in the city.

“They are trying to avoid work because of the heat since if they go to work they end up spending more at the hospital than for their food,” Begum said.

Tiwari and Chaturvedi both said it’s essential to give waste pickers access to a regular water supply, shade, or a relatively cool building near the landfills. They should also be encouraged to avoid working at high heat and given prompt medical care when they need it, they said.

Tiwari said India has taken significant steps to devise heat action plans but implementing the plans all across the country is a challenge.

“As a society, we have a responsibility to protect them (garbage pickers),” said Tiwari. Simple steps can help, such as offering them water if they’re standing outside people’s homes, rather than asking them to leave, he said.

Geeta Devi, a 55-year-old garbage picker also at the Bhalswa landfill in New Delhi, says when she feels dizzy in the heat she takes shelter and sometimes someone gives her water or food. But she has to work to earn the 150-200 rupees ($1.80 to $2.40) per day that puts food on the table for her children.

“It is difficult to do my job because of the heat. But I have no other job,” she said.
…

taipei, taiwan — Taiwanese singer and activist Panai called Saturday — at one of the most prestigious entertainment events in the Chinese-speaking world — for people not to forget China’s bloody 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters at Tiananmen Square. 

Chinese artists in recent years have largely stayed away from Taiwan’s Golden Melody Awards given renewed tension between democratically governed Taiwan and China, which views the island as its own territory, and the reference to Tiananmen is unlikely to endear Beijing to the ceremony. 

Taking the stage after winning for best Taiwanese language album at the ceremony in Taipei, Panai said this was the 35th anniversary of the awards. 

“The Tiananmen Square incident is also exactly 35 years old, let’s not forget,” she said. 

Chinese tanks rolled into the square before dawn on June 4, 1989, to end weeks of pro-democracy demonstrations by students and workers. Public discussion of what happened is taboo in China, though it is freely talked about in Taiwan. 

China says it “long ago” reached a clear conclusion about the events of 1989, and China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Panai has campaigned for years for the rights of Taiwan’s Indigenous people. 

“Democracy is a lengthy and not an easy journey, we are pressured as we don’t know if we will be bullied by a ‘bigger’ power,” she told reporters backstage after her win. 

“The reason why I mentioned that event on stage is because Taiwan’s democracy is a process that all of us need to cherish; our freedom and freedom of speech is what we need to protect.” 

No Chinese singers attended this year’s awards, despite several high-profile nominations, including Xu Jun winning for best composer. 

Another Chinese singer, Jude Chiu, did arrive in Taiwan but returned to the country before the awards for health reasons, Taiwan’s official Central News Agency reported. 

While Taiwan has only 23 million people, its pop music scene has an outsized cultural influence across East Asia, especially in China, in part due to creativity unencumbered by censorship. 

The awards celebrate not only Mandopop but artists singing in Taiwanese — also known as Hokkien — Hakka and Indigenous languages like Bunun, a visible sign of the Taiwan government’s efforts to promote once suppressed tongues. 
…

Bangkok — Crime empires embedded in Asia’s “Golden Triangle” border areas are getting richer and more powerful, blurring the lines between the illicit economy and the legitimate one as they diversify from drugs to wildlife trafficking, cyber scams and money laundering, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.

The Golden Triangle, which cuts across the borders of Thailand, Laos and Myanmar, is home to an array of transnational crime organizations that run multibillion-dollar enterprises with virtual impunity — and they are embracing new technology to make more profit.

Myanmar, which borders five countries, has long been the epicenter of many illegal Asia-Pacific trades. It has sunk into chaos since a 2021 coup, allowing crime groups to flourish in the lack of governance, especially in remote Shan State, which borders Thailand to the south and China to its east.

“Some of the challenges in Myanmar are really at the heart of the criminality we are seeing in and around the Golden Triangle,” said Benedikt Hofmann, UNODC deputy regional representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific.

“At the same time, Myanmar’s border areas are now much more connected to the rest of the region, and the spillover into Southeast Asia is growing,” he told VOA.

Fortunes carved out on unfettered methamphetamine production are now being multiplied with cyber scam parks and illicit wildlife trafficking — including bear bile and elephant ivory into southern China — and then laundered through casinos, the U.N. agency said in its annual World Drug Report earlier this week.

In the absence of serious law enforcement threats to their empires, the criminal networks working alongside armed groups in the Golden Triangle are getting bigger and more sophisticated in the ways they wash their money. They have been using an “underground banking infrastructure” of casinos, crypto and traditional currency exchanges to clean billions of dollars, Hofmann said.

“The line between the formal economy and criminal business is increasingly blurred, and corruption weakens governance systems in the region,” he said.

Increased Golden Triangle meth production is pushing drugs into new markets, as the price of yaba — addictive caffeine-laced meth pills taken across the Mekong River — crumbles to as low as $1 to $2 per pill, or less than a can of coke.

But cheaper meth has not come with “fluctuations in purity,” the study stated, driving up addiction rates in a region with limited resources and patchy political will for drug treatment and rehabilitation.

“There is a stronger focus now on a more balanced approach to drug control, taking into account both supply and demand of illicit drugs,” Hofmann said.

“But as drugs are getting cheaper and more accessible, including for very poor and young people, it is clear much more needs to be done in resourcing prevention and treatment systems that take care of those amongst the most vulnerable parts of society,” he said.

Myanmar’s conflict and chaos have exacerbated poverty in the border areas, in turn driving a surge in opium poppy production by poor rural communities.

Just this week, Myanmar’s Home Affairs Minister Lieutenant General Yar Pyae said in a statement: “In 2023, Myanmar saw a slight increase in illegal opium poppy cultivation. Therefore, the persuasion by the Myanmar Tatmadaw, Myanmar Police Force, and various departments to local ethnic communities in drug prevention efforts through educational activities has led to the destruction of a total of 6,181 acres of poppy fields during the 2023-2024 opium poppy cultivation season. The alternative development management sector is continuously carrying out the implementation of opium alternative development activities, the crop substitution sector, and the livestock breeding sector.”

Yet, Myanmar is now the world’s number one opium producer, as the Taliban cracks down on poppy cultivation — the base ingredient of heroin — in Afghanistan, the study said.

The report also warned of mounting environmental damage caused by the rampant meth trade. While there are no studies in hard-to-reach areas, the UNODC said as a rule, every kilogram of methamphetamine produced creates 5 to 10 kilograms of toxic chemical waste.

Thailand alone burned upwards of 340 tons of seized narcotics in December and a further 20 tons on June 26, world drug day.

The kingdom has launched a renewed drug crackdown, but methamphetamine, ketamine and heroin continue to pour through its borders and ports to the rest of Southeast Asia.

“The drug producers are still operating along the borders, pumping out hundreds of thousands of pills a day,” Krisanaphong Poothakool, a prominent criminologist and former senior Thai police officer, told VOA.

The latest seizures with new packets of branding point to new players entering the meth trade, as traffickers get increasingly skillful in the way they move their drugs.

“Producers in Thailand are also making the pills on the go in moving vehicles. It’s nearly impossible to intercept them all,” he said.

Insulated from crackdowns by remote Golden Triangle locations, alliances with powerful armed groups and easily corrupted officials, the crime organizations of Southeast Asia show no sign of slowing down.

Security experts warn that cyber scams with bases in Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia have made new fortunes for the crime lords and are becoming increasingly advanced with artificial intelligence and the reach of the internet.

“We are only at the beginning of a technology-driven revolution of the criminal ecosystem here, with implications for people far beyond this region,” Hofmann said.
…

GIMHAE AIR BASE, South Korea — The United States wrapped up its first multidomain exercise with Japan and South Korea in the East China Sea on Saturday, a step forward in Washington’s efforts to strengthen and lock in its security partnerships with key Asian allies in the face of growing threats from North Korea and China.

The three-day Freedom Edge increased the sophistication of previous exercises with simultaneous air and naval drills geared toward improving joint ballistic-missile defense, anti-submarine warfare, surveillance and other skills and capabilities.

The exercise, which is expected to expand in years to come, was also intended to improve the countries’ abilities to share missile warnings — increasingly important as North Korea tests ever-more sophisticated systems.

Other than Australia, Japan and South Korea are the only U.S. partners in the region with militaries sophisticated enough to integrate operations with the U.S. so that if, for example, South Korea were to detect a target, it could quickly relay details so Japanese or American counterparts could respond, said Ridzwan Rahmat, a Singapore-based analyst with the defense intelligence company Janes.

“That’s the kind of interoperability that is involved in a typical war scenario,” Rahmat said. “For trilateral exercises like this, the intention is to develop the interoperability between the three armed forces so that they can fight better as a cohesive fighting force.”

Such exercises also carry the risk of increasing tensions, with China regularly denouncing drills in what it considers its sphere of influence, and North Korea already slamming the arrival of the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier group in the port of Busan — home to South Korea’s navy headquarters and its Gimhae Air Base — in preparation for Freedom Edge as “provocative” and “dangerous.”

On Wednesday, the day after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol visited the Roosevelt in Busan, becoming the first sitting South Korean president to board a U.S. aircraft carrier since 1994, North Korea tested what it said was a multiwarhead missile, the first known launch of the developmental weapon, if confirmed.

South Korea’s military said a joint analysis by South Korean and U.S. authorities assessed that the North Korean missile launch failed.

The defense cooperation involving Japan and South Korea is also politically complex for Yoon and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, due to the lingering resentment over Imperial Japan’s brutal occupation of Korea before and during World War II.

The two countries have the largest militaries among American allies in East Asia — and together host some 80,000 American troops on their territories — but the U.S. has tended to work with them individually rather than together due to their history.

Kishida’s increase of defense spending and cooperation with South Korea have generally been well received by the Japanese public but has caused friction with the right wing of his own party, while Yoon’s domestic appeal has weakened, but he has stayed the course.

“South Korea’s shift under the Yoon administration toward improving its relations with Japan has been extremely significant,” said Heigo Sato, international politics professor and security expert at Takushoku University in Tokyo.

Both leaders are seen to be trying to fortify their defense relationships with Washington ahead of the inauguration of a new president, with South Korean officials saying recently that they hope to sign a formal security framework agreement with the U.S. and Japan this year that would lock in a joint approach to responding to a possible attack from North Korea.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration has also long been working to increase cooperation between South Korea and Japan — something that many didn’t think was possible at the start of his presidency, said Euan Graham, a defense analyst with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

“Credit where it’s due — the fact that it’s happening is a significant achievement from the administration’s regional policy,” he said.

Former U.S. President Donald Trump caused friction with both allies during his time in office by demanding greater payment for their hosting of U.S. troops while holding one-on-one meetings with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.

Under Biden, Washington is seeking to solidify its system of alliances, both with increasingly sophisticated exercises and diplomatic agreements, Graham said.

Tensions with North Korea are at their highest point in years, with the pace of Kim Jong Un’s weapons programs intensifying, despite heavy international sanctions.

China, meanwhile, has been undertaking a massive military buildup of nuclear and conventional weapons, and now has the world’s largest navy. It claims both the self-governing island of Taiwan and virtually the entirety of the South China Sea as its own territory and has increasingly turned to its military to press those claims.

China and North Korea have also been among Russia’s closest allies in its war against Ukraine, while Russia and China are also key allies for North Korea, as well as the military leaders of Myanmar who seized power in 2021 and are facing ever-stiffer resistance in that country’s civil war.

In Pyongyang this month, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Kim concluded a mutual defense pact, agreeing to come to the other’s aid in the event of an attack, rattling others in the region.

Despite a greater number of ships overall, China still only has three aircraft carriers compared to the U.S. fleet’s 11 — probably the most effective tool a country has to bring vast amounts of power to bear at a great distance from home.

China’s advantage, however, is that its primary concern is the nearby waters of the Indo-Pacific, while Washington’s global focus means that its naval assets are spread widely. Following the exercises in the East China Sea with Japan and South Korea, the Roosevelt is due to sail to the Middle East to help protect ships against attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

That has made strong security partnerships even more important, not only with Japan and South Korea but with Australia, the Philippines, Taiwan and others in the region, and building those up has been a priority for the Biden administration.
…

ISLAMABAD — The Taliban on Saturday ruled out any discussions on “internal issues” of Afghanistan, including women’s rights, with international envoys at a crucial United Nations-hosted meeting in Doha, Qatar.

Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban government spokesperson and head of its delegation attending the conference in the capital of the Gulf state, said before his visit to Doha that the two-day talks commencing Sunday would primarily center on Afghan economic issues and counternarcotics efforts.

“We acknowledge women are facing issues, but they are internal Afghan matters and need to be addressed locally within the framework of Islamic Sharia,” Mujahid told a news conference in the capital, Kabul, when asked whether Afghan women’s rights would be on the meeting agenda.

“Our meetings, such as the one in Doha or with other countries, have nothing to do with the lives of our sisters, nor will we allow them to interfere in our internal affairs,” he noted.

Special envoys from around two dozen countries, including the United States, will gather in Doha Sunday to interact with Taliban representatives for the first time since U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres initiated what is referred to as the “Doha process” a year ago.

The dialogue is aimed at developing a unified and coherent international approach to increase engagement with the fundamentalist Afghan authorities.

The Taliban stormed back to power in August 2021 as the U.S.-led foreign forces departed the country after almost two decades of involvement in the Afghan war. They have imposed their harsh interpretation of Islamic law, banning girls from schools beyond the sixth grade and many Afghan women from public and private workplaces, including the U.N., among other restrictions on their freedom.

The international community has refused to formally recognize the male-only Taliban government until it removes the restrictions on women and girls.

The Taliban defend their governance, saying it is aligned with Afghan culture and Islamic law. They were not invited to the first Doha meeting in May 2023, and they refused an invitation to the second in February. Both events were hosted by Guterres himself.

The U.N. is under fire for excluding women Afghan representatives from Sunday’s talks. The decision has triggered outrage among global human rights groups and female rights advocates, who argue that the Taliban’s curbs on women and girls should be a central focus of any discussions about the future of Afghanistan.

Mujahid defended the decision to skip previous Doha talks, saying Taliban representatives were invited only for limited interactions and they were refused a meeting with the U.N. secretary-general.

He said that other groups promoting “violence and disharmony” in Afghanistan also were invited to those sessions as representatives of the country despite Taliban objections. “Now the [Taliban] conditions have been accepted that this time it will not happen,” Mujahid claimed.

The U.N. spokesperson announced on Friday that Rosemary DiCarlo, its undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, will host the Doha meeting of special international envoys on behalf of Guterres and raise women’s issues.

In addition, Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York that DiCarlo and special international envoys will meet on Tuesday with representatives of Afghan civil society, including human rights and women’s organizations and advocates — a day after the two-day session with the Taliban ends.

“The undersecretary-general will raise the rights of women and girls, human rights in general, and political inclusion in the discussions in Doha that she will be having with the de facto [Taliban] authorities,” Dujarric said.

“The ultimate objective of the process is an Afghanistan at peace with itself and its neighbors, fully integrated into the international community and meeting its international obligations, including on human rights, and particularly on the rights of women and girls,” Dujarric said.

Mujahid insisted that the Taliban’s participation in Sunday’s Doha meeting would mutually benefit Afghanistan and the world and help restore the country’s dialogue with the West.

The U.S. and Western countries at large have isolated the Taliban over their harsh treatment of Afghan women and other human rights concerns. They moved their diplomatic missions to Doha after the Taliban takeover, terminated economic development aid for the country, and isolated the Afghan banking sector over terrorism-related sanctions on many leaders of the de facto government in Kabul.

However, most of Afghanistan’s neighbors, including China, Iran and Pakistan, and many regional countries such as Russia and Turkey have retained their embassies and increased diplomatic engagement with the Taliban.

The Taliban maintain they have restored peace in war-torn Afghanistan, and their crackdown on narcotics, including a nationwide ban on poppy cultivation, has almost ended illicit drug production in the country.

The U.N. has endorsed those claims, stating that the prohibition has resulted in a 95% decrease in drug production in a country that was previously the world’s largest producer.
…

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — When Ngarauru Mako told her family she was calling off Christmas festivities in favor of celebrating Matariki, the Māori new year holiday that’s experiencing a renaissance in New Zealand, her children didn’t believe her.

“We grew up with Christmas because it was just what you did, but I realized it wasn’t my thing,” said Mako, who is Māori, a member of New Zealand’s Indigenous people. “I just decided myself to cancel Christmas, be the Grinch, and take on Matariki.”

Now in its third year as a nationwide public holiday in New Zealand, Matariki marks the lunar new year by the rise of the star cluster known in the Northern Hemisphere as the Pleiades. The holiday is seeing a surge in popularity, even as political debates about race in New Zealand have grown more divisive. Accompanying the holiday’s rise is a tension between those embracing Indigenous language and culture, and a vocal minority who wish to see less of it.

“For much of our past, since the arrival of settlers to this land, mostly out of Great Britain, we’ve really looked to mimic and build our identity off Great Britain,” said Rangi Mātāmua, professor of Mātauranga Māori -– Māori knowledge — at Massey University and an adviser to the government on Matariki.

“But I think as we’ve moved a number of generations on, Aotearoa New Zealand is starting to come of age in terms of our understanding of our identity,” he added, using both the Māori and English names for the country.

When New Zealand established the national day in 2022, it became the first nation in the world to recognize an Indigenous-minority holiday, scholars including Mātāmua believe. But many did not know what it was. Even so, 51% of people did something to mark the day, official figures show, and that number grew to 60% in 2023. Matariki falls on a different midwinter date each year based on the Māori lunar calendar; in 2024 it was officially celebrated June 28.

A 700-year-old tradition that fell out of observance in modern times — even among the 1 million Māori who make up New Zealand’s population of 5 million -– the fortunes of Matariki changed over the past few decades, as Māori language, culture and traditions saw a passionate resurgence.

“Māori culture has been oppressed for a long, long time. We lost our reo — our language — nearly, we nearly lost our identity,” said Poropiti Rangitaawa, a musician who performed Māori songs this month at a family Matariki celebration outside of Wellington, the capital city. “But with the hope of our people, our old people, our ancestors, they have brought it up and now it’s really strong.”

The carnival day at Wainuiomata where Rangitaawa played was one of many events New Zealanders of all ethnicities attended to mark Matariki. Some attended predawn ceremonies where steam from food is released to “feed the stars” and lists of names are read remembering the dead and those born since the last celebration.

Dotted around Wellington were remembrance spots — in the back room of a church, in a garden -– where visitors displayed notes to those they had lost: a dad, an aunt, a cat.

“It’s only just now that I’m realizing Matariki is about the stars, and I love the fact that they’ve got a star for the ones we’ve lost in the year,” said Casey Wick, attending a celebration with her family.

For many, a growing knowledge of the holiday has come through their children, which is typical of New Zealand’s Indigenous movement. Protests in the 1970s seeking recognition of the language gave rise to Māori language pre-schools whose first generation of graduates are fluent speakers.

Every elementary school in New Zealand now recognizes Matariki, and many this month hosted shared meals for families to celebrate. Children come home singing the names of the nine Matariki stars to the tune of the Macarena.

“I learn more from her about Matariki than I could ever give to her,” said Liana Childs, whose daughter Akaylia, 9, recited the stars of the cluster perfectly. The family is not Māori, Childs said, but they studied the Māori seasons, which guide the planting of crops and when to hunt.

“I think it’s just brought us closer together as a family,” she said.

The political climate for Māori language and culture, however, is complicated.

Words in the language are now commonplace in conversations, but Māori has its detractors, too. Matariki was established as a national day under New Zealand’s previous center-left government, which urged the country to embrace Māori culture. The government, however, was often decried for doing little to address woeful economic, health and justice issues for Māori that became entrenched after New Zealand was colonized in the 19th century.

A change of government last October meant a new era for Matariki. The party leading the current center-right coalition supports the day, but one of its coalition partners does not. The government has also pledged to scrap some policies recognizing Māori that were passed by its predecessors, getting rid of a Māori health agency that prioritized Indigenous New Zealanders, who die younger than people of non-Maori descent; reversing a movement to grant Māori names to government agencies, some of which have already reverted to their English titles; and halting plans for shared management of public utilities with Māori tribes.

One of the governing parties has provoked a fresh debate about New Zealand’s founding document, the Treaty of Waitangi -– signed between Māori tribes and the British Crown in 1840 -– with the suggestion that modern interpretations have given Māori too many rights. The rumblings about a revisited treaty have prompted protest marches.

“Governments will come and governments will go,” said Mātāmua, the professor. “Matariki existed before government, and it will continue to exist after the current government.”

Māori language and culture almost died out when earlier politicians opposed their expression, Mātāmua said, but in a nation where many are now enthusiastic about it, any government trying to curtail the celebration would learn “that perhaps trying to put this genie back in the bottle would be very, very difficult.”

At the Matariki celebration in Wainuiomata, Tash Simpson stood with friends at a stall that fused Māori and Kenyan crafts.

“We’re stronger now. Our people are more knowledgeable now,” she said of political threats to Māori. “But now we know what’s coming and we’re ready.”
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KATHMANDU, Nepal — At least nine people, including three children, were killed after heavy monsoon rains in west Nepal triggered landslides, an official said on Saturday.

Five members of a family were sleeping when their house was washed away by a landslide in Malika village in Gulmi district, about 250 kilometers west of Kathmandu, according to Dizan Bhattarai, a spokesperson for the National Disaster Rescue and Reduction Management Authority.

“Bodies of all five have been recovered,” Bhattarai told Reuters, adding that the family included two children.

In neighboring Syangja district, one woman and her 3-year-old daughter died in a landslide that swept away their house, while in Baglung district, which borders Gulmi, two people were killed in another landslide.

At least 35 people across Nepal have died in landslides, floods and lightning strikes since mid-June when annual monsoon rains started. Rains normally continue until mid-September.

Landslides and flash floods are common in mostly mountainous Nepal during the monsoon season and kill hundreds of people every year. 
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Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia — Mongolian Prime Minister Luvsannamsrain Oyun-Erdene declared victory early Saturday in parliamentary elections, after a contest dominated by deepening public anger about corruption and the state of the economy. 

People across the vast, sparsely populated nation of 3.4 million, sandwiched between China and Russia, voted Friday to elect 126 members of the State Great Khural. 

With 100 percent of votes counted by machine, the prime minister told a press conference in the capital, Ulaanbaatar, a few hours after polls closed that his ruling Mongolian People’s Party (MPP) had won a majority of seats. 

“According to the pre-results, the Mongolian People’s Party has 68 to 70 seats,” he said. 

The vote, he said, represented a “new page” in “democratic debate.” 

The votes were being counted by hand, and an official result was expected later Saturday. 

If the preliminary results hold, the MPP will see its overall share of parliamentary seats fall, from a supermajority of 79% in 2020 to about 54% in the new one. 

Results tallied by local media outlet Ikon based on official data also showed the MPP winning 68 seats, with the main opposition Democratic Party winning 42. 

The minor anti-corruption HUN party won eight, Ikon reported. 

Voter turnout was 69.3% nationally, a screen at the country’s Electoral Commission headquarters showed. 

Julian Dierkes, a professor at the University of British Columbia and an expert on Mongolian politics, wrote that “everything points to a reduced MPP majority with a surprisingly strong showing” by the Democratic Party. 

“The relatively strong turnout,” he said, also suggests “desire for some change.”

Deep frustration 

Analysts had expected the MPP to retain the majority it has enjoyed since 2016 and govern for another four years. 

They say the party can credit much of its success to a boom in coal mining that fueled double-digit growth and dramatically improved standards of living, as well as to a formidable party machine and a weak, fractured opposition. 

Yet there is deep public frustration over endemic corruption, as well as the high cost of living and lack of opportunities for young people who make up almost two-thirds of the population. 

There is also a widespread belief that the proceeds of the coal-mining boom are being hoarded by a wealthy elite – a view that has sparked frequent protests. 

Broad spectrum 

The streets of Ulaanbaatar, home to almost half of Mongolia’s population, have been decked out this week with colorful campaign posters touting candidates from across the political spectrum, from populist businessmen to nationalists, environmentalists and socialists. 

Parties are required by law to ensure that 30% of candidates are women in a country where politics is dominated by men. 

Preliminary results Saturday suggested that 25% of seats in the new parliament would be held by women, up from 17% in 2020. 

The MPP is the successor to the communist party that ruled Mongolia with an iron grip for almost 70 years.  

It remains popular, particularly among rural, older voters, and commands a sprawling, nationwide campaign apparatus.
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