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doha, qatar — A United Nations-led international conference ended Monday with consensus on the goals Taliban rulers must meet but little progress on how the world should coordinate engagement with the unrecognized government.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres convened special representatives to Afghanistan from 25 countries as well as the European Union, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization for a two-day conference in Qatar’s capital, Doha.

The Taliban refused to attend, saying participation was “unbeneficial” if the U.N. did not see them as the sole representatives of Afghanistan.

However, Rosemary di Carlo, U.N. undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, met separately with a Taliban representative from the group’s Doha-based political office.

At the press briefing after the event, Guterres rejected the notion that the U.N. failed to bring Afghanistan’s de facto rulers to the table because of ineffective communication, saying the conditions the Taliban had placed were unacceptable.

“These conditions, first of all, denied us the right to talk to other representatives of the Afghan society and demanded a treatment that would, I would say, to a large extent be similar to recognition,” Guterres said.

Supporting the Taliban, Russia said the hardline group’s decision to not attend, “as they were offered to take part only in a marginal part of the meeting,” was “valid.”

Questioning the selection of the few Afghan civil society members invited, the Russian delegation refused to engage with them.

At Afghan authorities’ request, Russian representatives “decided to abstain from the conveners’ meeting with the participation of so-called Afghan civil society participants, who were, by the way, chosen in a nontransparent manner, behind Kabul’s back,” a Russian Embassy statement posted on social media said.

Speaking to reporters at U.N. headquarters in New York, Russia’s permanent representative to the world body, Vassily Nebenzia, told reporters his country was not abandoning the issue of Afghan women’s rights. He defended the Russian decision to reject meeting Afghan activists as a pragmatic choice.

“There are other things for Afghanistan that should be dealt with and should be attended to … and we have to engage with those people who rule Afghanistan now,” he said.

Consensus and criticism

The meeting, convened to discuss the recommendations of a U.N.-sponsored, independent assessment of Afghanistan, saw “complete consensus” on the goals outlined in last year’s review, Guterres said.

These goals include having an Afghan government that is inclusive, rather than the all-male, predominantly Pashtun Taliban setup; ending the restrictions on women’s mobility and their right to study and work; and preventing Afghanistan from becoming a terrorist hotbed.

China’s special envoy for Afghanistan, Yue Xiaoyong, however, signaled some disagreements as well.

“Some of the members also emphasized the need to unfreeze the overseas assets of $7 billion to Afghanistan – the need to lift the unilateral sanction[s] by United States,” Yue told reporters on the sidelines of the event.

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.

Yue said foreign nations should not impose themselves on Afghanistan.

“The international community, they are coming to help, not to impose, not to put pressures, but show respect to Afghanistan so that all sides can come to have engagement, to have dialogue,” he said.

China is the only country that has sent an ambassador to Kabul under the Taliban rule and has received a Taliban ambassador as well. Still, Beijing insists it has not recognized the Taliban government.

Special envoy

The Doha huddle also discussed the appointment of a U.N. special envoy to Afghanistan, a position the independent assessment recommends.

According to U.N. documents, the envoy will “focus on diplomacy between Afghanistan and international stakeholders and advancing intra-Afghan dialogue.”

Most members of the Security Council support the idea; China and Russia abstained from voting on it.

The Taliban oppose such an appointment, arguing that the U.N. Assistance Mission to Afghanistan, or UNAMA, already exists.

“We need to have clear consultations with the Taliban in order to have a clarification of the role of that envoy, of who can be that envoy, in order to make it attractive from the point of view of the Taliban,” the secretary-general said.

A source told VOA that delegates agreed the special envoy should be from the region and have knowledge of Islam, the religion of most Afghans.

More engagement

Despite the Taliban’s absence, the secretary-general said the conference was “extremely useful” and hoped the rulers in Kabul would join next time.

Responding to a VOA question on how the Taliban’s future participation would be possible if they insisted on recognition, Guterres suggested more engagement.

“With different levels of organizing the meetings, I think we will find easily a solution to allow for the participation of the Taliban,” he said.

Asif Durrani, Pakistan’s special representative for Afghanistan, told VOA in Doha that the U.N. and the Taliban would have to try harder to ensure the de facto rulers come to the next meeting.

The “Taliban are a reality, so you have to devise ways and means to do business with them. But at the same time, they also have to take certain responsibilities,” Durrani said.

Speaking to VOA on the sidelines in Doha, Rina Amiri, U.S. special envoy for Afghan women, girls and human rights, said the demand to ensure women’s rights would stay on the table.

“I can assure you that on the issue of women’s rights and human rights, we have said it’s central and it’s nonnegotiable,” she said.

VOA U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer contributed to this report.
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ISLAMABAD — Major political parties in Pakistan have been struggling to cobble together a coalition government nearly two weeks after the controversy-marred national elections produced no clear winner.

The political party of former Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), held a fresh meeting Monday with the Pakistan Peoples Party, (PPP) led by former Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, to discuss the possibility of forming a coalition.

The talks between the two traditional ruling parties, bitter rivals of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party (PTI) began last week after PML-N nominated Sharif to become prime minister again, and Zardari announced conditional support for his candidacy, saying the PPP would not join the government nor take Cabinet posts. 

PML-N, which is believed to be favored by the military, and PPP have both won 75 and 54 seats, respectively. However, dozens of the seats are being legally challenged by rival parties.

A group of independent candidates backed by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s PTI, are leading, with at least 93 seats out of 266 up for grabs in the 336-seat lower house of parliament but not enough to form a governing majority.

The remaining 70 seats in the legislative assembly are reserved for women and religious minorities and are allocated based on political parties’ proportional representation in the election results.

Khan’s party alleges a state-orchestrated electoral fraud deprived it of a parliamentary majority. Otherwise, it would have 180 seats, allegations that government officials deny.

Sharif formed a coalition government with the PPP and became the prime minister for the first time after a vote of no-confidence removed Khan from office in April 2022 after a falling out with the military leadership. However, the Sharif administration failed to effectively govern and address the economic challenges he inherited. 

PTI announced Monday that all of its backed, successful independent candidates would join a smaller parliamentary religious group, known as the Sunni Ittehad Council, to enable the party to claim its share of reserved seats in the National Assembly. Candidates who win elections without a party platform are not allocated reserved seats.

While addressing a joint news conference with the PTI leadership in Islamabad, the leader of the religious party, Hamid Raza, said that both parties had signed a memorandum and that all directions would come from Khan.

Critics have warned that even if Sharif’s party succeeds in forming a coalition government, Khan’s massive public support suggested Pakistanis are fed up with the military’s intervention in politics to facilitate family-run parties like PPP and PML-N to return to power time and again. 

“After the most controversial elections since 1977, What Next?” Senator Mushahid Hussain, a veteran influential PML-N politician, said on social media platform X. 

Hussain urged his party’s leadership to respect the PTI mandate as the largest single parliamentary group and warned that “any hotchpotch patchwork coalition won’t work and will be a recipe for disaster, similar to the tragic aftermath of flawed 1977 polls!”

The senator referred to the chaos and violence that followed the rigged vote in 1977 and allowed the military to seize power to rule Pakistan for the next decade or so.

Khan, 71, has been in jail since August on a series of controversial charges, including corruption, leaking state secrets while in office, and having a fraudulent marriage, barring him from contesting the polls. 

The legal challenges were part of a military-backed crackdown on his party that detained PTI leaders, raided their homes and harassed female relatives, forcing many to quit the part or politics altogether. Mainstream media came under censorship orders allegedly from the military to avoid mentioning Khan’s name on air.

The critical blow came just weeks before the elections when Pakistan’s election commission, in a widely criticized decision, banned PTI from using its iconic cricket bat symbol on the ballot paper in a county where more than 40% of the population is illiterate and voters rely on electoral symbols to identify their candidates. 

Censorship 

Meanwhile, social media users across the country largely remained cut off from X for a second day on Monday in the aftermath of widespread protests of alleged vote-rigging in the February 8 polls and allegations that the results were manipulated to help pro-military parties.

NetBlocks, an independent watchdog tracking global cybersecurity and internet governance, confirmed what it said was the latest “national-scale disruption” in the country of about 241 million people. 

“Metrics show X/Twitter has now been restricted in #Pakistan for over 48 hours as concerns mount over election fraud; authorities have failed to provide a lawful basis for the measure, which violates the public’s fundamental right to free expression at a critical moment,” NetBlocks said on X.

Government officials have refused to comment on the social media disruption. Pakistani authorities also suspended nationwide mobile phone and internet services on election day over terrorism threats, fueling vote-tampering suspicions and drawing an international backlash. 

The internet disruptions Saturday — occurring shortly after a top bureaucrat publicly confessed to helping manipulate election results in five districts under his supervision — gave credence to allegations of vote fraud.

Liaqat Ali Chatha, commissioner of Rawalpindi Division, where the military is also headquartered, told reporters in his office that he was resigning from his post and turning himself in to police custody.

Chatha accused Pakistan’s chief election commissioner and the chief justice of orchestrating the electoral wrongdoing, charges that both denied. A high-level investigation has since been launched. 

Pakistan’s interim Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, apparently responding to criticism of top government functionaries over their alleged interference in the disputed elections, warned that such a campaign was a breach of law.

Kakar’s office quoted him as saying in a statement that “some elements” were “using different tricks, including the weaponization of social media in blackmailing and pressurizing civil servants to switch their loyalties from the state of Pakistan to the violent gang.” 

The prime minister did not elaborate and added, “The state of Pakistan shall defend the civil servants in discharging their constitutional duties, act against these violent trolls and ensure exemplary punishment to them.”

Critics said pro-democracy activists in Pakistan had been using X and other social media platforms to get around sweeping media censorship in the lead-up to, on, and after the February 8 vote.

The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, or HRCP, also criticized the government for blocking internet access, saying such actions “bleed online businesses and comers” at a time when the national economy is already struggling.

“It also infringes on people’s right to democratic decision-making, information, and expression. This practice must stop immediately,” the HRCP said in a post on X.  
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WASHINGTON — U.S. lawmakers are raising alarms about what they see as America’s failure to compete with China in biotechnology, warning of the risks to U.S. national security and commercial interests. But as the two countries’ rivalry expands into the biotech industry, some say that shutting out Chinese companies would only hurt the U.S.

Biotechnology promises to revolutionize everyday life, with scientists and researchers using it to make rapid advances in medical treatment, genetic engineering in agriculture and novel biomaterials. Because of its potential, it has caught the attention of both the Chinese and U.S. governments.

Bills have been introduced in the House and Senate to bar “foreign adversary biotech companies of concern” from doing business with federally funded medical providers. The bills name four Chinese-owned companies.

The Chinese Embassy said those behind the bills have an “ideological bias” and seek to suppress Chinese companies “under false pretexts.” It demanded that Chinese companies be given “open, just, and non-discriminatory treatment.”

The debate over biotechnology is taking place as the Biden administration tries to stabilize the volatile U.S.-China relationship, which has been battered by a range of issues, including a trade war, the COVID-19 pandemic, cybersecurity and militarization in the South China Sea.

Critics of the legislation warn that restrictions on Chinese companies would impede advances that could bring a greater good.

“In biotech, one cannot maintain competitiveness by walling off others,” said Abigail Coplin, an assistant professor at Vassar College who specializes in China’s biotech industry. She said she was worried that U.S. policymakers would get too obsessed with the technology’s military applications at the cost of hindering efforts to cure disease and feed the world’s population.

In a letter to senators sponsoring the bill, Rachel King, chief executive officer of the trade association Biotechnology Innovation Organization, said the legislation would “do untold damage to the drug development supply chain both for treatments currently approved and on market as well as for development pipelines decades in the making.”

But supporters say the legislation is crucial to protecting U.S. interests.

The National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology, a group created by the U.S. Senate to review the industry, said the bill would help secure the data of the federal government and of American citizens and it would discourage unfair competition from Chinese companies.

The commission warned that advancement in biotechnology can result not only in economic benefits but also rapid changes in military capabilities.

Much is at stake, said Rep. Mike Gallagher, chair of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party. Gallagher introduced the House version of the bill and last week led a congressional delegation to Boston to meet with biotech executives.

“It’s not just a supply chain battle or a national security battle or an economic security battle; I would submit it’s a moral and ethical battle,” Gallagher said. “Just as the sector advances at a really astronomic pace, the country who wins the race will set the ethical standards around how these technologies are used.”

He argues that the U.S. must “set the rules of the road” and if not, “we’re going to live in a less free, less moral world as a result.”

Both the United States and China, the world’s two largest economies, have identified biotech as a critical national interest.

The Biden administration has put forward a “whole-of-government approach” to advance biotechnology and biomanufacturing that is important for health, climate change, energy, food security, agriculture and supply chain resilience.

The Chinese government has plans to develop a “national strategic technology force” in biotech, which would be tasked with making breakthroughs and helping China achieve “technological independence,” primarily from the U.S.

“Both the Chinese government and the Americans have identified biotech as an area important for investment, a sector that presents an opportunity to grow their economy,” said Tom Bollyky, the Bloomberg chair in global health at the Council on Foreign Relations. He said any restrictive U.S. measures should be tailored to address military concerns and concerns about genomic data security.

“Naturally there’s going to be competition, but what’s challenging in biotech is that we are talking about human health,” Bollyky said.

Ray Yip, who founded the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention office in China, also worries that the rivalry will slow medical advancements.

The benefit of coming up with better diagnostics and therapy is beyond any individual country, Yip said, “and will not overshadow the capacity or prestige of the other country.”

What concerns Anna Puglisi, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, is Beijing’s lack of transparency and its unfair market practices. “Competition is one thing. Unfair competition is another thing,” she said.

Puglisi described BGI, a major Chinese biotech company identified in both the House and Senate bills, as “a national champion” that is subsidized and given favored treatment by the state in a system that “blurs private and public as well as civilian and military.”

“This system creates market distortions and undermines the global norms of science by using researchers and academic and commercial entities to further the goals of the state,” Puglisi said.

BGI, which has stressed its private ownership, offers genetic testing kits and a popular prenatal screening test to detect Down syndrome and other conditions. U.S. lawmakers say they are concerned such data could end up in the hands of the Chinese government.

The Defense Department has listed BGI as a Chinese military company, and the Commerce Department has blacklisted it on human rights grounds, citing a risk that BGI technology might have contributed to surveillance. BGI has rejected the allegations.

In raising its concerns about BGI, the National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology says the company is required to share data with the Chinese government, has partnered with the Chinese military, and has received considerable Chinese state funding and support.

State subsidies have allowed BGI to offer genomic sequencing services at a highly competitive price that is attractive to U.S. researchers, according to the commission. The genomic data, once in the hands of the Chinese government, “represents a strategic asset that has privacy, security, economic, and ethical implications,” it said.

BGI could not immediately be reached for comment.
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Taipei, Taiwan — Chinese coast guard officials briefly boarded a Taiwanese ship Monday, Taipei said, after Beijing announced it would step up patrols following a boat incident in which two Chinese nationals died.

The boat was carrying four Chinese nationals when it capsized last week near Taiwan’s Kinmen islands while pursued by the Taiwanese coast guard.

All four onboard were thrown into the water and two of the crew later died. The two rescued were detained in Kinmen — a territory administered by Taiwan but located just five kilometers (three miles) from China’s city of Xiamen.

Taiwan had defended its actions by saying the boat was in prohibited waters, while China said it would increase “law enforcement patrol operations” in the area.

On Monday, Taipei’s coast guard announced that two Chinese coast guard boats near Kinmen had approached a Taiwanese cruise ship.

“Six mainland coast guard officers boarded the ship. After inspecting the ship’s voyage plan, ship certificate, the captain and crew’s licenses and the captain’s signature, they left the ship,” it said in a statement.

Taipei’s coast guard dispatched personnel who arrived shortly after their Chinese counterparts had left the cruise ship, which carried 11 crew members and 23 passengers.

They “accompanied the ship all the way back to Shuitou Port” in Kinmen, the coast guard said, urging China “to uphold peace and rationality.”

Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council — which handles issues regarding Beijing — also announced late Monday that the families of the detained Chinese crew members involved in the capsizing are expected to arrive in Kinmen on Tuesday.

The Straits Exchange Foundation — a semi-official Taiwanese body that handles technical and business affairs with China — said permits were issued Monday to the families.

The foundation “will also send personnel to Kinmen to provide humanitarian care to the mainland family members who will arrive in Kinmen on February 20 and assist them in

handling the aftermath,” it said.

The February 14 incident occurred against a backdrop of heightened tensions between China and Taiwan, a self-ruled island that Beijing claims as part of its territory.

Beijing has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, and in recent years ramped up the rhetoric of “unification.”

It has increased military pressures on Taiwan by deploying warplanes and naval vessels around the island nearly daily.

Taiwan also recently had a presidential election in January which saw the win of Democratic Progressive Party’s Lai Ching-te — a candidate Beijing considers a “separatist.”
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Kabul, Afghanistan — A landslide caused by heavy snowfall has killed 25 people and injured eight others in the eastern Afghan province of Nuristan, a disaster management ministry spokesperson said Monday.

Earth, snow and rubble swept through the village of Nakre in the Tatin valley of Nuristan overnight Sunday.

“As a result of the landslide, some 25 people have been killed and eight injured,” spokesperson Janan Sayeq said in a video clip shared with media.

Sayeq also told AFP the death toll could rise.

Nuristan province, which borders Pakistan, is mostly covered by mountainous forests and hugs the southern end of the Hindu-Kush mountain range.

Provincial officials said snow has also hampered rescue efforts.  

“Due to clouds and rain, the helicopter cannot land in Nuristan,” said Mohammad Nabi Adel, the head of public works in the province.

Adel said snow had blocked one of the main roads into the province, making “the rescue operation difficult.”

Around 20 houses were destroyed or heavily damaged, the provincial head of information and culture Jamiullah Hashimi told AFP.  

Snow continued to fall as rescuers tried to dig people out of the rubble, Hashimi said, noting that the efforts were hampered not only by weather but the lack of equipment in the remote area.

“Modern equipment, tools, and facilities are not available for the rescue operation,” he said.

Rescuers relied on shovels, axes and other hand tools to dig through the earth and rubble to retrieve the dead.

Large boulders also fell in the landslide and had to be blasted with explosives to make way for the rescuers.

Afghanistan is one of the world’s poorest countries, racked by decades of war, prone to natural disasters and vulnerable to extreme weather events linked to climate change.  

Soil erosion risks

Mountainous areas of Afghanistan have long been vulnerable to landslides and floods, but in recent years risks have increased due to deforestation and drought, worsened by climate change, experts say.  

“When vegetation cover or the forests are cut down, or if green coverage doesn’t exist in the area, soil erosion occurs,” said Rohullah Amin, head of climate change for the National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA).

“With soil erosion, when it rains or snows and the vegetation cover… doesn’t exist anymore it causes such landslides.”

The arrival of snow this season was delayed across much of Afghanistan, which is accustomed to harsh winters but in its third year of drought.

Officials said there has been less snowfall in Nuristan compared to previous years, though Amin said the province was not less hard-hit by drought than other parts of the country.

“This year we had little snow, and it doesn’t last for long,” said Adel.

The exceptionally low level of rain in a country that relies heavily on agriculture forced many farmers to delay planting.  

The South Asian country was once flush with humanitarian aid following the U.S.-led occupation but funding to Afghanistan has plummeted since the Taliban returned to power in mid-2021, in part because of the many restrictions it imposed on women.
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Yangon, Myanmar — Two people were killed in a crush outside a passport office in Myanmar on Monday, a rescue worker said, as thousands rush to leave the country to escape a junta military service law.

Two women aged 52 and 39 died early Monday after hundreds of people surged to get in line at the passport office in second city Mandalay, a rescue worker who arrived at the scene told AFP.

“There was a ditch near the crowd. They fell into the ditch and died from a lack of oxygen,” the rescue officer said, requesting anonymity for security reasons.

Another woman was slightly injured, the officer said, adding that all three had been selling tokens assigning numbers in the queue.

Local media also reported the deaths.

Three years after seizing power in a coup, the military is struggling to crush widespread armed opposition to its rule.

In recent weeks it has lost territory and control of lucrative trade routes to China to an alliance of ethnic minority armed groups.

Earlier this month it said it would enforce a law allowing it to call up all men aged 18-35 and women aged 18-27 to serve in the military for at least two years.

The law was written by a previous junta but never used, and it remains unclear how it will be enforced.

No details have been given about how those called up would be expected to serve, but many young people are not keen to wait and find out.

Last week local media images showed hundreds of people queueing outside the passport office in Mandalay.

In commercial hub Yangon thousands of young men and women queued outside the Thai embassy seeking visas to get out of Myanmar last week.

Around 13 million people will be eligible to be called up, a junta spokesman said last week, though the military only has capacity to train 50,000 a year.

The junta has previously said it is taking measures to arm pro-military militias as it battles opponents across the country — both anti-coup “People’s Defence Forces” (PDFs) and more long-standing ethnic minority armed groups.

 
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TAIPEI, Taiwan — China has ramped up efforts to challenge the longstanding status quo across the Taiwan Strait in recent weeks, with Beijing altering a flight path near the median line of the Taiwan Strait and announcing the plan to increase regular patrol in waters near Taiwan’s Kinmen island.

Some analysts say the series of moves are part of Beijing’s attempt to erode Taiwan’s ability to maintain control over waters near islands like Kinmen and Matsu, which are just a few kilometers from the Chinese mainland, and increase pressure on the incoming administration under the ruling Democratic Progressive Party.

“These moves are efforts to erode Taiwan’s ability to administer places like the waters around [the offshore islands] and the west side of the median line of the Taiwan Strait,” Ian Chong, a political scientist at the National University of Singapore, told VOA by phone.

He said the latest development is a departure from Beijing’s past behavior. “From the second Taiwan Strait Crisis on, Beijing never tried to challenge Taipei’s control over Kinmen and Matsu, since leaders on both sides of the Taiwan Strait at the time thought these offshore islands acted as a connection between Taiwan and the Chinese mainland,” Chong said.

After two Chinese fishermen drowned in a chasing episode with the Taiwanese Coast Guard last week, the Chinese Coast Guard announced on Feb. 18 that its Fujian division would increase patrols in the coastal city of Xiamen, which is just a few kilometers away from the Taiwanese island of Kinmen.

The Chinese Communist Party’s Taiwan Affairs Office, which is in charge of cross-strait relations, expressed its support for the Chinese Coast Guard’s announcement, calling the move essential for “upholding order in the relevant waters and ensuring the safety of” Chinese fishermen’s lives and property.

In addition to increasing patrols in waters near Xiamen and Kinmen, the Taiwan Affairs Office also claimed on Saturday that there were no restricted areas for fishing near Kinmen Island, refuting the Taiwanese government’s insistence that it reserves the right to take defensive actions against any Chinese vessel entering “prohibited” waters controlled by Taipei.

Some experts say China’s plan to increase the frequency of coast guard patrol in waters near Taiwan’s offshore islands could further strain cross-strait relations and disrupt Taiwanese fishing vessels’ activities in the region.

“In the past, authorities in Taipei and Beijing could use an existing coordinating mechanism to safeguard the environment in the Taiwan Strait, but the Chinese government’s attempt to hype up the deaths of the two Chinese fishermen may further strain cross-strait relations,” Su Tzu-yun, a military analyst at the Taipei-based Institute for National Defense and Security Research, told VOA by phone.

He said Beijing’s attempt to step up patrols in waters near Kinmen could increase disruption to Taiwanese fishing vessels’ operation in the region. “If the Chinese Coast Guard increases their activities near Taiwan’s offshore islands, Taiwanese fishing vessels could encounter arbitrary search requested by the Chinese Coast Guard or they may be forced to change route,” Su added.

China’s decision to change a flight path west of the median line of the Taiwan Strait, which acts as an unofficial demarcation between Taipei and Beijing, also has triggered angry responses from the Taiwanese government, which characterized the move as an attempt to change status quo across the Taiwan Strait.

Su in Taiwan said China’s sudden change of the flight route is part of its campaign to turn the Taiwan Strait into a domestic waterway as well as part of the ongoing attempt to weaken Taiwan’s sovereignty. “It’s clear that the Chinese government’s move to activate the flight route closer to the median line of the Taiwan Strait is an attempt to erode Taiwan’s sovereignty in the strait,” he told VOA.

In his view, the latest wave of gray zone operations initiated by Beijing will heighten tension in the region and increase other countries’ concerns about China’s aggressive posture. Gray-zone operations involve using irregular tactics without resorting to open combat.

“Since China’s attempt to unilaterally challenge the regional status quo is usually unpredictable, it will likely increase tension in the region,” he said, adding that Beijing’s attempt may force regional countries to join forces and push back against the Chinese government.

With around three months until Taiwan’s new administration comes into power, Chong in Singapore said he expects Beijing to initiate more gray zone activities around Taiwan to keep up the pressure on the incoming government.

“Beijing’s approach has been to put more pressure on [Taiwan’s president-elect] Lai Ching-te and his incoming administration to see whether they’ll slip up or make a new mistake,” he told VOA, adding that the latest development is part of the Chinese government’s planned process. “We’re probably looking into the next year where Beijing will continually try to test Taipei.”

As pressure from Beijing is likely to persist, some analysts say Taiwan needs to ensure its military and naval vessels maintain a certain level of deployment readiness while trying to prevent tension from escalating to an uncontrollable level.

“Taiwan needs to be prepared for the worst-case scenario and ensure some of its vessels can be deployed when necessary,” Lin Ying-yu, a military expert at Tamkang University in Taiwan told VOA by phone.

“Taiwan also needs to be prepared for the possibility of resuming some dialogue or interaction with China over issues such as maritime law enforcement,” he added. 

 
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SYDNEY — A group of asylum-seekers has been flown from Australia to Nauru, after they were discovered in a remote part of Western Australia.

Their arrival on the Australian mainland reignited the political debate about immigration policy and border protection.

The Canberra government has been criticized by the conservative opposition of losing control of Australia’s maritime borders.

About 40 men, reportedly from Pakistan and Bangladesh, were discovered near a remote Indigenous community near Beagle Bay in Western Australia.

They have been flown to an Australian-sponsored offshore migrants processing center on the tiny Pacific island of Nauru, where their refugee claims will be assessed.

For over a decade, Australia has employed tough border protection policies.

Since 2013, the Australian navy has been ordered to tow or turn away migrant boats trying to reach Australia. The policy is called Operation Sovereign Borders and has the support of both major parties in Canberra.

Conservative opposition leader Peter Dutton told reporters that the Labor government had lost control of the nation’s borders.

“I do not know whether the same level of surveillance is being undertaken as was the case when we were in government,” he said.

But Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told local media that his government remains committed to securing Australia’s maritime borders.

“Operation Sovereign Borders is in place. If you arrive here by boat, you will not be settled here,” he said.

Migrants arriving by boat seeking asylum in Australia are not committing a crime. Australia calls them “unauthorized maritime arrivals.”

The number of boat arrivals in Australia has been relatively small in recent years. Local media report that 199 migrants arrived on seven boats in 2022 and 74 people on four boats in 2023. 
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Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea — Papua New Guinea police said 53 people have been killed in tribal violence in the country’s volatile highlands, the latest in a string of mass deaths linked to long-running feuds.

Police Commissioner David Manning on Sunday said that officers and soldiers had retrieved the bodies of 53 men.

They are believed to have been killed near the town of Wabag, 600 kilometers northwest of the capital Port Moresby.

The exact circumstances of the deaths were not immediately clear, but police said there had been reports of heavy gunfire.

The incident is thought to be linked to a conflict between Sikin and Kaekin tribesmen.

Highland clans have fought each other in Papua New Guinea for centuries, but an influx of automatic weapons has made clashes more deadly and escalated the cycle of violence.

Police received videos and photos purporting to be from the scene. They showed bloodied and badly wounded bodies lying by the side of the road and piled up on the back of a flatbed truck.
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Doha, Qatar — A two-day United Nations-led conference on the way forward in Afghanistan started in Qatar’s capital Doha, Sunday, without the Taliban, the de facto rulers, in attendance.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres convened the meeting of special envoys for Afghanistan from 25 countries as well as Afghan civil society members, including women, and representatives of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the European Union, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

Participants will explore how to engage with the Afghan Taliban in a coordinated manner in light of an independent assessment of Afghanistan mandated by the U.N. Security Council last year.

The Taliban were also invited to Doha for meetings, however, the group refused to attend.

“We had some conditions, that we should have full participation in all sessions, that were not met, so we didn’t participate,” Suhail Shaheen, the head of the Taliban’s political office in Doha, said in a message to media via the text messaging application WhatsApp.

In an official statement issued on social media platform X, the night before the conference kicked off, the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that without the U.N. recognizing the Taliban as the only official representative of Afghanistan, attending the conference was “unbeneficial.”

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has clarified to the U.N. that if the Islamic Emirate is to participate as the sole official representative of Afghanistan… then participation would be beneficial. Else, ineffectual participation by the Emirate due to non-progress in this area was deemed unbeneficial,” the ministry said.

The Taliban use the term Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan or IEA for their administration.

A source told VOA some participants were disappointed the U.N. could not bring the Taliban to the table.

A delegate who wished to remain anonymous, as he was not authorized to speak publicly on the topic, said that despite the Taliban’s absence, the conference was significant as it showed that the international community was refocusing on Afghanistan while the wars in Ukraine and Gaza were occupying global attention.

Responding to a VOA question on the sidelines of the event, Pakistan’s charge d’affaires in Afghanistan, Ubaid-ur-Rehman Nizamani, said the conference was relevant even without the Taliban.

“I think it [the conference] is about Afghanistan, not about Taliban,” Nizamani said.

Pakistan’s delegation led by Asif Durrani, the country’s special representative for Afghanistan, separately met with Shaheen and his team in Doha.

Afghan affairs observer and journalist Sami Yousafzai told VOA in Doha that the Taliban wasted an opportunity by not showing up.

“I think the Taliban made a mistake [by not attending], and this will increase the gap between Taliban and the international community…the international community recognizes that the Taliban are a reality and wants to speak to them as that, but their absence, I think, hurts the Afghan people as well,” Yousafzai said.

Since taking over, the Taliban have barred girls from getting an education beyond the sixth grade, forbid women from going to universities and working in most professions, limited their movement outside without a male family member, and barred them from parks and public baths. The Taliban have acknowledged that female police officers are arresting women for not covering themselves appropriately.

In a throwback to its first stint in power, from 1996 to 2001, the ultra-conservative group also resumed public floggings in parts of the country.

The Taliban argue such actions are permitted by Islam, and local culture but critics reject their defense as a misinterpretation of the religion and culture of Afghanistan. The de facto rulers reject international calls for reform as unilateral demands and coercion.

Some warn that attempts to increase global engagement with the group will further embolden its hardline stance.

“It will not be a good idea to move forward with more engagement with Taliban because the nature of Taliban and their behavior shows in the past 30 months that they are getting worse towards women and men,” former Afghan diplomat Shukria Barakzai said.

A prominent former Afghan female politician and Kabul’s ambassador to Norway, Barakzai spoke to VOA on the phone from the United Kingdom, where she fled a week after the Taliban took control of her homeland in August 2021.    

While no country has recognized the Taliban government, many routinely engage with its leaders. The international community has acknowledged the Taliban’s success in reducing violence in the country and diminishing the drug trade. However, demands to form an inclusive government, and soften its stance on women’s rights — prerequisites for recognition — have not borne results.

In the lead up to the Doha huddle, Amnesty International, in a statement, called on participants to stop taking a “business as usual” approach regarding human rights in Afghanistan.

“The culture of impunity that enables the Taliban’s ongoing grave human rights violations needs to be addressed urgently,” the statement said, quoting Senior Director Deprose Muchena.

Foreign ministers of a dozen countries taking part in the Munich Security Conference 2024, an annual high-level discussion forum, also issued a statement Sunday expressing concern over the severe curbs on women’s freedoms in Afghanistan. It linked recognition of the Taliban government with improved human rights.

“Adherence to Afghanistan’s international obligations by the de facto authorities, especially pertaining to human rights, remains one of the central prerequisites for the reintegration of the State of Afghanistan into the international system,” the statement concluded.
…

LAUSANNE, Switzerland — The International Olympic Committee will not change its rules to let boxing great Manny Pacquaio compete at the Paris Games aged five years beyond the entry limit.

Pacquaio, who retired in 2021, wanted to box at age 45 in the Olympic tournament in Paris where medal bouts will be held in the Roland Garros tennis complex. 

The IOC said Sunday it wrote to Olympic officials in Philippines explaining the age limit for boxers of 40 will be upheld. The IOC now oversees Olympic boxing after de-recognizing the International Boxing Association governing body. 

The age limit for Olympic boxing was raised to 40 from 34 in 2013 — a move that would have let Pacquaio try to compete at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. He chose not to at the time when he was also elected to be a senator in his home country. 

It is unclear if Pacquaio would have tried to earn a place at the Paris Olympics in one of two qualification tournaments that open later this month in Italy and in May in Thailand. 

The Philippines Olympic body had talked of trying to get a so-called “universality” entry to the Paris Summer Games. These are effectively free passes to events given to countries that have few athletes at the Olympics and typically struggle to qualify on merit. 

However, the IOC explained Sunday that the Philippines had been too successful to benefit from the scheme. 

“Universality places are not allocated to (teams) with an average of more than eight athletes in individual sports/disciplines at the last two editions of the Olympic Games,” the IOC said. “This is the case for the Philippine Olympic Committee.” 

Pacquaio ended his storied career in September 2021 at age 42 after 72 fights, winning 12 world titles at a record eight different weight divisions.
…

KATHMANDU, Nepal — Nepal’s gods and goddess are returning home.

An unknown number of sacred statues of Hindu deities were stolen and smuggled abroad in the past. Now dozens are being repatriated to the Himalayan nation, part of a growing global effort to return such items to countries in Asia, Africa and elsewhere.

Last month, four idols and masks of Hindu gods were returned to Nepal from the United States by museums and a private collector.

Among them was a 16th century statue of Uma-Maheswora, an avatar of the gods Shiva and Parvati, that was stolen four decades ago. It was not clear who took it or how it ended up at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, which handed it over to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

Devotees celebrated its return in Patan, south of the capital, Kathmandu. The stone-paved alleys were crowded with devotees offering money and flowers. Men in traditional attire played drums and cymbals and chanted prayers.

“I cannot say how extremely happy I am right now,” said Ram Maya Benjankar, a 52-year-old who said she had cried as a child after learning the statue had been stolen and waited years for its return.

The statue had simply disappeared from their neighborhood, she said.

The majority of Nepal’s 29 million people are Hindu, and every neighborhood has a temple that houses such items. They are rarely guarded, making it easy for thieves.

For Nepalese, the idols have religious significance but no monetary value. For smugglers, however, they can bring huge value abroad. For years, there was little attention given to the thefts or any effort made at recovery.

That has changed in recent years as the government, art lovers and campaigners pursue stolen heritage items. They have been successful in many cases.

A group representing the ethnic Newar community from Nepal in the U.S. heard about the reappearance of the Uma-Maheswora statue at the Brooklyn Museum and took the initiative to bring it home.

“We were very sad to see that our gods were locked in the basement. We were then determined that we need to take back the heritage,” said Bijaya Man Singh, a member of the group that carried the four idols and masks back to Nepal.

Now the temple in Patan is being prepared to reinstate the Uma-Maheswora statue. Following the welcome ceremony, it was placed on a chariot carried by devotees and taken to a museum, where it will be kept under security until its final move.

More than 20 other stolen artifacts are in the pipeline to be repatriated to Nepal in the near future, according to Jayaram Shrestha, director at the National Museum in Kathmandu. Most will return from the United States and Europe.

Shrestha has built a special room to exhibit repatriated items so the public can come and worship if they want. There are currently 62 statues on display.

“As we expect many to come soon, we are expanding the section of the museum,” Shrestha said. “I don’t want to store them in storage. They should be made available.”

It has become easier to locate stolen items as awareness grows among Nepalis at home and abroad. They can now track artifacts online when they are exhibited or put up for auction.

And more collectors and museums now believe they should be taken back to where they belong, Shrestha said.

“The Nepal government has been taking initiative to get them back with recovery campaigns and using diplomatic channels, embassies in foreign countries,” he said.

“We have made it clear that they need to be reinstated to their original place and security ensured to keep these thousands-of-years-old artifacts safe.”” said Nepal’s foreign minister, Narayan Prakash Saud.
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BANGKOK — China is stepping up patrols in the waters off the coast of Taiwan’s Kinmen archipelago, days after two of its fishermen drowned while being chased by the Taiwanese coast guard, which accused the boat of trespassing.

The Chinese coast guard’s Fujian division will regularly monitor the waters off the southern coast of the city of Xiamen — a few kilometers from Kinmen — to strengthen maritime law enforcement, said the coast guard’s spokesman, Gan Yu, in a statement Sunday.

Fishermen from Taiwan and China regularly sail that stretch of water which has seen a rise in tensions as the number of Chinese vessels — including sand dredgers and fishing boats — have notably increased in the area.

Kinmen residents have complained of both the noise and sound pollution from the vessels, as well as losses to their livelihood in fishing.

The fishermen’s deaths are unusual despite the level of Chinese activity in the waters near Kinmen, which is closer to China than it is to Taiwan’s main island. China claims all of self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory.

On Wednesday, Taiwan’s Coast Guard said two of four Chinese fishermen died after their boat capsized. It said their boat was fishing about one nautical mile away from Kinmen archipelago which Taiwan has claimed as a restricted area. The other two survivors remain in Taiwan’s custody.

China has issued a furious condemnation and blamed Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party for the fishermen’s deaths. It also said that there was no such thing as “restricted” waters.

Taiwan said an investigation was underway and that its Mainland Affairs Council said they were communicating with Chinese authorities.

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office vowed on Sunday further measures, without clarifying further detail.

“The Mainland reserves the right to take further action, and all the consequences will be borne by Taiwan,” said Zhu Fenglian, spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office.

Taiwan split from China during the 1949 civil war, but Beijing continues to regard the island of 23 million with its high-tech economy as Chinese territory and has been ramping up its threat to achieve that by military force if necessary.
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MUNICH — Top diplomats from the U.S. and China on Friday held a “candid and constructive” discussion on issues vexing their strained relations over Taiwan, the situation in the South China Sea, Russia’s war against Ukraine and synthetic opioids, the State Department said. 

The meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference marked the latest and highest-level meeting between the two sides since U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping held talks late last year in California. 

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Blinken emphasized the importance of maintaining peace in the Taiwan Strait and expanding on nascent counternarcotics efforts. Blinken also raised concerns about China’s support for Russia’s defense industrial base that Washington sees as helping Moscow’s military operations against Ukraine. 

“The two sides had a candid and constructive discussion on a range of bilateral, regional and global issues as part of ongoing efforts to maintain open lines of communication and responsibly manage competition in the relationship,” Miller said. 

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Wang called on the U.S. to remove sanctions against Chinese companies and individuals. 

Wang emphasized that Washington’s policy of “de-risking” economically from Beijing “has become ‘de-Sinicizing,’ ‘building a tall fence’ and ‘de-coupling from China’” and “will come back to bite the U.S. itself,” according to a ministry readout Saturday morning. 

He also called on the U.S. to stop searches of Chinese nationals. Recently, Chinese state media published reports of Chinese citizens being searched at the U.S. border. 

In one prominent case, a group of students led by their professor, Xie Tao from Beijing Foreign Studies University, were interrogated for three hours upon arriving at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, according to Xinhua. Xie is the dean of the School of International Relations and Diplomacy at the University. 

Wang affirmed that cooperation to combat the spread of fentanyl was going “positively” and would continue, as well as the agreement to keep military-to-military communications. Both sides also discussed the ongoing Israel-Hamas war and the war in Ukraine. 

Blinken “reiterated that the United States will stand up for our interests and values and those of our allies and partners,” Miller said, adding that the current situations in the Middle East and with North Korea had also been topics of conversation. 

“Both sides recognized the importance of maintaining open lines of communication between the United States and (China) across a range of strategic issues, including consultations and high-level meetings in key areas in the coming months,” he said. 
…

BANGKOK — Former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was released on parole early Sunday from a Bangkok hospital where he spent six months serving time for corruption-related offenses.

Thaksin was seen wearing a neck support inside one of the cars in a convoy leaving the Police General Hospital just before sunrise, and arrived at his residence in western Bangkok less than an hour later. A homemade banner with the words “Welcome home” and “We’ve been waiting for this day for so so long” was seen hanging at the front gate of his house.

A polarizing figure in Thai politics over the last two decades, Thaksin was in office from 2001 until he was toppled in a 2006 coup. He was later convicted of abuse of power and other misdeeds while in office and returned in August from more than a decade of self-imposed exile to serve his prison sentence.

His original eight-year sentence was commuted to only a year by King Maha Vajiralongkorn on September 1. Thaksin had called his convictions politically motivated.

Justice Minister Tawee Sodsong confirmed approval of Thaksin’s parole last week, citing the possibility of early release for inmates who have serious illnesses, are disabled or are over age 70. Thaksin is 74 years old.

He was confined to a police hospital in Bangkok. Opponents charged that serving his sentence in a hospital was a privilege.
…

islamabad — A high-ranking Pakistan government officer stepped down Saturday after admitting his involvement in manipulating the results of last week’s National Assembly elections, which were marred by accusations of massive electoral fraud and returned no clear winner.  

Liaqat Ali Chatha, the commissioner of the Rawalpindi region that comprises five districts, made the shocking revelation amid nationwide protests led by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI, and other political parties.  

The PTI claims that the February 8 polls for the lower house of parliament were tampered with to block an outright PTI victory and help candidates fielded by the military-backed rival Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz or PML-N party. 

“I am taking responsibility for all the wrongdoing I have committed during this election,” Chatha told a hurriedly convened news conference in his Rawalpindi office.  

“We put fake stamps on ballot papers, turning losers into winners and reversing margins of 70,000 votes at times across 13 National Assembly seats,” he added, but not providing evidence to support his claims. 

“I apologize to all my returning officers who were working under my supervision and crying when I pushed them to commit a wrongful act against their free will,” Chatha said.  

The senior bureaucrat claimed that he had even contemplated suicide because his wrongful act of “stabbing the country in its back” did not let him sleep over the past week.  

Election commission rejects allegations

The rigging allegations stemmed from an unprecedented nationwide suspension of mobile phone and internet services shortly before polling started on election day. The vote count took nearly three days to conclude, fueling doubts about the credibility of the electoral process.  

Chatha accused Pakistan’s chief election commissioner and the Supreme Court chief justice of involvement in manipulating the elections. He sought punishment for all those responsible for the electoral fraud, including himself. The officer was later taken into police custody for charges not known immediately. 

The election commission swiftly rejected Chatha’s allegations. It said in a statement that the commission had not instructed him to “change of election results” and promised to launch an investigation into the controversy.  

Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa denied the charges, telling reporters outside the Supreme Court in Islamabad that baseless allegations hold no weight without evidence. 

Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, the interim Pakistani prime minister, urged political parties and individuals Saturday to seek legal redress through the available channels for complaints regarding electoral irregularities. He defended the elections as “a step towards promoting democracy” in the nuclear-armed country of about 241 million people. 

“Pakistan’s legislative, judicial, and executive branches are resilient and stand ready to deliver impartial justice to all,” said the prime minister. “While peaceful protest and assembly are fundamental rights, any form of agitation, violence, or incitement for vigilantism will not be condoned, and the law would take its course without hesitation.” 

A group of independent candidates, most of them loyal to Khan, won the highest number of seats, 101, in the 266-seat legislative assembly, while the PML-N of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif secured 75 seats, with neither getting enough for a simple majority.  

The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) of former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari won 54 seats, and the rest were taken by smaller regional parties. 

Khan’s PTI defied a monthslong state crackdown in the lead-up to the February 8 polls, shattering campaigning and arresting scores of its leaders.  

The PTI nominees were compelled to contest the election as independent candidates. That was because the Supreme Court validated the election commission’s controversial decision to take away the party’s cricket bat symbol, which had been an integral part of its identity.  

The decision was made just weeks before the election, and it significantly impacted the party’s chances of winning in a country with high illiteracy rates and where symbols on the ballot papers play a crucial role in helping voters identify their preferred candidates. Despite the clampdown, PTI-backed candidates won most seats to the surprise of many observers.   

Salman Akram Raja, one of the prominent national-level PTI candidates allegedly forced to lose, said his party was determined to press ahead with its legal and street agitation to get back their seats.  

“If the state officials responsible for safeguarding the election can be won over and can do what they did, then every election to be carried out in Pakistan becomes a farce,” Raja told a news conference in Islamabad on Friday.  

“That is why we are standing up, and we are saying this farce must be reversed,” he said, denouncing the alleged vote fraud as a wholesale assault on democracy in Pakistan. 

Commission seeks independent audit

On Saturday, the leading nongovernmental Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, or HRCP, released its investigative report on the elections, demanding an independent audit into irregularities and rigging allegations.  

The HRCP said its election observers had conducted “spot checks” in more than 50 constituencies and noted that “the countrywide internet and cellular services shutdown on polling day and arbitrary changes in polling information compromised voters’ access to polling stations.” 

The watchdog said the post-polling process was “clearly unsatisfactory,” and the “protracted delay in the announcement of election results” was particularly a cause of concern.  

“The integrity of the 2024 elections was compromised, not only by lack of competence on the part of the ECP (Election Commission of Pakistan) but also by constant pressure from extra-democratic quarters and questionable decisions by the caretaker government,” said the HRCP, referring to the country’s powerful military. 
…

ISLAMABAD — The Afghan Taliban have decided not to participate in a U.N.-sponsored conference on Afghanistan in Qatar’s capital Doha.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will host a two-day gathering beginning Sunday in Doha, where member states and special envoys to Afghanistan will discuss engagement with the Taliban.

In a statement issued Saturday evening on social media platform X, the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said a delegation would attend only if the Taliban were accepted as the single official representative of Afghanistan.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has clarified to the U.N. that if the Islamic Emirate is to participate as the sole official representative of Afghanistan … then participation would be beneficial. Else, ineffectual participation by the Emirate due to non-progress in this area was deemed unbeneficial,” the ministry said.

The Taliban use the term Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, or IEA, for their administration.

The United Nations has invited Afghan civil society members, as well as groups opposed to the Taliban, to meet with special envoys for Afghanistan.

“There will be a meeting with the Taliban, but there will also be a meeting of envoys with civil society, including women’s groups, because it’s important that the voices of Afghan women be heard very loud and clear,” Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for the U.N. secretary-general said in the daily press briefing Friday. His remarks came prior to the Taliban’s refusal to attend.

Expressing opposition to the inclusion of non-Taliban voices, the foreign ministry said it was possible to achieve progress in talks “if the U.N. takes stock of current realities, rebuffs influence and pressure of a few parties.”

The statement released just hours before the conference begins put an end to days of confusion about whether the de facto rulers of Afghanistan would attend.

Earlier, Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi’s office had quoted him telling the Russian Ambassador Dmitry Zhirnov that de facto rulers had “shared our views on the possible participation.”

“If there is an opportunity for high-level meaningful consultations between IEA and [the] U.N. regarding all issues of Afghanistan, and the IEA is able to duly fulfill its responsibility as the representative of Afghanistan, then the Doha meeting would be a good opportunity.”

Doha conference

The conference in Doha is the second U.N.-led international dialogue on Afghanistan since the Taliban took control of the country in August 2021 after the end of a 20-year war with the U.S. and its allies.

While the Taliban were not invited to the first global assembly in May 2023, the U.N. was seeking the group’s presence this time.

“An important aspect of the event is the intention to provide the opportunity for the special envoys to meet collectively with Afghan stakeholders, including representatives of the de facto authorities and Afghan civil society participants, including women,” Dujarric told VOA earlier this week.

Along with discussing how the international community should engage with the Taliban — and addressing the plight of Afghan women and girls who are barred from studying and working — the conference is expected to discuss the appointment of a special U.N. envoy for Afghanistan.

The Taliban oppose such an appointment.

Recognition issue

Despite controlling Afghanistan for more than two years, the Taliban have failed in their bid for official recognition. The U.N. has refused to grant the group Afghanistan’s seat at the world body.

While many countries have embassies in Kabul and foreign officials engage regularly with Taliban representatives, only China has accepted an Afghan ambassador and sent its envoy to Kabul. However, Beijing insists it has not officially recognized the Taliban government.

The international community demands that to be recognized, the Taliban must form an inclusive government and lift the ban on women’s education and work.

The Taliban foreign ministry statement issued Saturday rejected efforts to push the group to soften its stance.

“If repetition of failed 20-year experimentation is discarded, and a realistic and pragmatic approach is adopted over unilateral impositions, accusations and pressurization, then progress can also be made in bilateral relations with other parties.”

VOA U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer contributed to this story.
…

Taipei, Taiwan — Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, once a fierce critic of China, has emerged as the likely winner of Indonesia’s presidential election. His presumed victory, analysts say, is unlikely to lead to any major shifts in the Southeast Asian nation’s relations with Beijing.

However, concerns about work safety and environmental pollution linked to Chinese investments, as well as Beijing’s claims in the South China Sea, could test the stability of the relationship.

While President Joko Widodo was in office, China became Indonesia’s largest trading partner, tapping into its rich resources. Jokowi, as he is often called, has urged China to bring even more capital to Indonesia, which has become a key participant in its Belt and Road Initiative.

Beijing has invested billions supporting major infrastructure construction in Indonesia, including the Jakarta-Bandung High Speed Railway, which opened in October, and Cirata, Southeast Asia’s largest floating solar power project, which went completely online last year.

“I don’t think there will be a dramatic change in relations with China,” Faisal Nurdin Idris, a lecturer at the department of international relations at UIN Jakarta, told VOA Mandarin Service. “Jokowi has built a strong relationship economically with China.”

During his previous run for president in 2019, Prabowo tried to turn Jokowi’s warm relations with China against him, seizing on public anger against Beijing with suggestions that Chinese workers were stealing local jobs.

But in more recent speeches, Prabowo has expressed a desire to have good relations with the U.S. and China at the same time.

Speaking at a forum at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta in November, he noted that Washington played a historic role in pressuring the Netherlands to recognize Indonesian sovereignty in the 1940s and praised China’s economic accomplishments.

Despite their benefits to development, China’s investments in Indonesia have also come with controversy.

Teuku Rezasyah, associate professor in international relations at Padjadjaran University, said Indonesia has previously reported several accidents at Chinese-owned factories and environmental pollution incidents that have raised dissatisfaction among locals.

He said this is a problem that Prabowo must carefully consider before taking office.

Otherwise, even if the government welcomes Chinese investment with open arms, it may cause local environmental and social problems, and improper handling could trigger anti-China sentiment.

“Some Chinese investment came too quickly to Indonesia. Often, it was a political decision,” Teuku said. “Demonstrations came in Morowali because the people found that the investment would not benefit them.”

At the end of last year, an explosion occurred at one of the Chinese-financed nickel processing plants in Indonesia’s Morowali Industrial Park and killed 21 people. The incident became the third fatal event at a Chinese-owned nickel smelter in Central Sulawesi that year, and hundreds of Indonesian workers protested at the factory. Police this week named two Chinese citizens as suspects.

Prabowo is aware of the problems at some investment projects, and he has from now until he is sworn in in late October to come up with solutions, Teuku said.

In addition to Chinese investment, how Prabowo will handle the sovereignty issues between Indonesia and China in the future will also be key to watch.

Like several of its Southeast Asian neighbors, Indonesia disputes China’s claim to most of the South China Sea, including part of Indonesia’s internationally recognized exclusive economic zone. However, the dispute has not involved confrontations such as those between the Philippines or Vietnam and China.

Yohanes Sulaiman, associate professor in international relations at Universitas Jenderal Achmad Yani, Cimahi, Indonesia, said that if Beijing continues its military expansion in the South China Sea, Prabowo may respond aggressively.

“His response will depend on what China does,” he said. “If China is using water guns and water cannons like it did in the Philippines, you can expect an equally forceful response from Indonesia, unlike Joko Widodo. If there are too many controversies, then you can expect, above all, that we are kind of escalating.”

Faisal Nurdin Idris believes that Prabowo may first discuss South China Sea issues with other ASEAN countries that also have sovereignty disputes with China in hopes that the countries can take a united stand against Beijing.
…

washington — Labor protests in China have increased rapidly since August of last year, according to rights groups, especially in the lead-up to Lunar New Year, which began late last week.

Labor protests more than tripled in the fourth quarter of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022, according to data collected by New York-based international rights group Freedom House’s China Dissent Monitor, which tracks protests in China. Analysts say this unrest is linked to poor working conditions and China’s ongoing economic difficulties.

The China Dissent Monitor recorded 777 labor protests in China between September and December 2023, compared to 245 in the same period of 2022.

Independent data from the Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin, which promotes Chinese workers’ rights, recorded an additional 183 protests between January 1 and February 3, including 40 in Guangdong province alone.

Kevin Slaten, who leads the China Dissent Monitor, said worker protests are often linked to wage disputes and occupational safety.

“The long-term problems underlying these disputes in China are poor enforcement of labor protections and a complete lack of independent and effective labor unions,” Slaten told VOA in an emailed statement.

Slaten said most of the protests that China Dissent Monitor has analyzed are small in size, with half having less than 10 participants and 40% more having between 10 and 99 protesters.

Li Qiang, founder and executive director of New York-based China Labor Watch, which advocates for the Chinese labor movement, said that in addition to China’s economic slowdown, an “implosion” in the real estate sector and reduced manufacturing was also a factor.

“China’s high-level economic problems ultimately set the foundation of the increase in labor protests this year,” Li told VOA in an emailed response. “Due to the decrease of manufacturing orders, among other things, a lot of companies face financial challenges that trickle down to workers.”

Construction workers are particularly likely to protest, Slaten said, especially considering the major difficulties facing the Chinese real estate sector, most notably the bankruptcy of major property developer Evergrande Group.

“China’s relative economic slowdown and particularly an ongoing crisis in the property sector and its impact on construction workers is contributing to this surge in labor dissent,” Slaten wrote.

Migrant construction workers, who Li said often do not have legally binding contracts with their employees, have been hit particularly hard by the property sector’s collapse.

Late last year, China State Councilor Shen Yiqin warned of “severe” punishments for employers who intentionally delayed paying their workers and urged local governments to make sure all workers received their pay on time. Shen made her remarks at a national teleconference on wage arrears ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday.

Liu Jun, a migrant from Sichuan province who works in construction in Xinjiang, said he has been waiting nearly two months for his paycheck.

“It’s almost the end of the year and I haven’t been given any money yet,” Liu told VOA Mandarin. “This is all the hard-earned money of the construction workers, and they should be paid after the work is done.”

Ma Hui, a construction worker from Hebei province who also works in Xinjiang, said her boss did not pay workers for a three-month period last year, only providing workers with noodles, salt and light soy sauce to eat.

“During that period, I had no living expenses for several months, and my boss wouldn’t lend me any money,” Ma told VOA Mandarin. “I didn’t even have money to buy basic daily necessities such as toilet paper and toothpaste.”

Li said local governments’ budget shortfalls are preventing them from stepping in to aid migrant workers.

“In the past, the Chinese government has been investing capital annually to alleviate companies’ liquidity pressure and reduce the overall numbers of wage arrears towards the end of the year,” Li wrote. “Additionally, they would also strengthen the implementation of their monitoring apparatus to combat labor-related disputes. But this year, the situation shifted as the Chinese government [especially on the local level] faces financial pressures.”

Zhang Chao, a worker from Zhejiang province who helped build facilities in Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics, said he hopes construction workers’ benefits can increase commensurate with the difficult, dangerous work they do.

“Migrant workers have limited abilities and can only do the hardest and most tiring work, exchanging life and health for money,” Zhang told VOA Mandarin. “My biggest wish in our industry is not to be afraid of hardship and sweat, and I just hope that I can get the salary I deserve.”

VOA Mandarin Service reporter Zhang Mulin also contributed to this report.
…

washington — Days before a U.N.-sponsored conference on Afghanistan, it remains unclear whether the Taliban will attend what analysts describe as an opportunity for a “constructive dialogue” between the country’s de facto rulers and the international community.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will host the two-day gathering opening Sunday in Doha, where member states and special envoys to Afghanistan are expected to discuss engagement with the Taliban.

Tadamichi Yamamoto, former U.N. special representative to Afghanistan and head of its Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, called Sunday’s meeting — the U.N. chief’s second Afghan-focused summit in Doha — “a great opportunity.”

Taliban representatives, who were not invited to the first meeting in May 2023, have been invited to Sunday’s meeting. Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, however, said Wednesday that the Taliban would participate only if they were received as official representatives of Afghanistan.

“If the IEA [Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan] conditions are not taken into consideration, nonparticipation would be preferred,” said Muttaqi.

Neither the U.N. nor any other country officially recognizes the Taliban as the legitimate rulers of Afghanistan, although China has accepted the credentials of their envoy in Beijing.

Significance of invitation

Yamamoto told VOA that he hoped the Taliban would attend the meeting, as it could provide a venue for a “constructive dialogue.”

“It is important for the Taliban to realize that the invitation to attend the conference itself is an acknowledgment of the importance that the international community attaches to the dialogue with the Taliban,” he said.

The Taliban had criticized the first meeting May 2023, saying it would be “ineffective” without their participation.

Ramazan Bashardost, a former member of Wolesi Jirga, the lower house of the former Afghan parliament, told VOA he found it “interesting” that the Taliban had now put conditions on their participation.

“The Taliban may be afraid that their political and armed opposition might also participate in the conference, which will be a significant blow to the Taliban,” he said, adding that the Taliban typically stress their total control of Afghanistan with “no opposition” to their rule.

Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for the U.N. secretary-general, said it would be critical to hear from Afghan women in the Doha meeting.

“There will be a meeting between the envoys and civil society groups, which will, of course, include Afghan women,” Dujarric said in the daily press briefing on Thursday.

After seizing power in August 2021, the Taliban imposed repressive measures on women, banning them from obtaining secondary and university education, traveling long distances without close male relatives, working with government and nongovernment organizations and going to gyms or parks.

Special envoy 

The conference will also discuss the appointment of a U.N. envoy. The U.N. Security Council adopted a resolution in December requesting that the secretary-general appoint a special envoy for Afghanistan “provided with robust expertise on human rights and gender, for coordination of the world community’s engagement with the Taliban in Afghanistan.”

The Taliban oppose the appointment of a U.N. envoy to the country.

Barnett Rubin, a former U.S. diplomat and expert on Afghanistan, told VOA that the Taliban do not see a need for a new U.N. envoy as they do not believe that “such a dialogue is necessary or desirable.”

“So, they believe that the reason for the envoy is to encourage a political dialogue that will be the formation of more inclusive government,” said Rubin.

After seizing power, the Taliban formed an all-male and Taliban-only caretaker government. Rubin said the Taliban “want to maintain a monopoly on power; that is why they rejected U.N. envoy.” 

No recognition

The international community has called on the Taliban to form an inclusive government as one of the conditions for recognition.

Rubin said the Taliban have already built relations with neighboring states without formal recognition, adding that the Taliban feel no reason for “any concessions” to the international community.

In addition to forming an inclusive government, the international community has also called on the Taliban to respect human rights, particularly women’s rights, and fulfill their counterterrorism commitments.

But the Taliban have not fulfilled any of their commitments, said Ryan Crocker, former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan.

He told VOA that the international community should “make it clear that the Taliban does not deserve recognition or any form of legitimacy because they are behaving like an illegitimate regime, which they are.”

Crocker added that there is “no justification” for any country to recognize the Taliban’s government.

“I think it’s very important that this conference in Doha reemphasizes that,” he said.

Waheed Faizi of VOA’s Afghan Service contributed to this report, which originated in VOA’s Dari Service. 
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