Pakistan’s caretaker Foreign Minister Jalil Abbas Jilani confirmed Thursday that his government has decided to force out all Afghans and other foreign nationals living unlawfully in the country.

The move will likely affect about 1 million Afghans, including those who took refuge in the country after the hard-line Taliban swept back to power in neighboring Afghanistan two years ago.

The United Nations is alarmed by the plan because it could affect Afghans in need of international protection. Their lives or freedom would be in danger if they were forcefully repatriated, a U.N. official cautioned in background discussions with VOA.

“The new policy approved by the cabinet does not pertain only to Afghans; it is about all those people from different countries who are illegally residing in Pakistan,” Jilani told a news conference in Islamabad.

He explained that officially registered Afghan refugees and those living lawfully would not be asked to leave Pakistan. “But those who have come here illegally, whether Afghans or nationals of any country, will have to go back to their respective countries. We will strictly implement the policy.”

The spokesperson for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees in Islamabad told VOA that his agency was “seeking clarity” from Pakistani counterparts about the new policy.

Qaiser Khan Afridi noted that Pakistan’s role as a “generous refugee host for decades” has been acknowledged globally, but more needs to be done to match this generosity. “Any refugee return must be voluntary, without any pressure to ensure protection for those seeking safety,” he said.

“UNHCR stands ready to support Pakistan in developing a mechanism to manage and register people in need of international protection on its territory and respond to particular vulnerabilities,” Afridi added.

Until the Taliban returned to power in August 2021, Pakistan officially hosted nearly 2.7 million Afghans. That included 1.3 million registered refugees and 880,000 officially documented economic migrants; the rest were declared unlawful migrants.

The Taliban takeover of Kabul triggered a fresh influx of refugees, bringing more than 700,000 Afghans to Pakistan.

An estimated 200,000 have since flown to the United States and European countries under special resettlement programs for their services to U.S.-led international coalition forces, which all chaotically withdrew two years ago after almost two decades of presence in Afghanistan.

Most of the remaining Afghans have either crossed the border into Pakistan unlawfully, or their visas have expired, according to Pakistani officials.

The Taliban have imposed their strict interpretation of Islamic law in Afghanistan since regaining power, placing sweeping restrictions on women.

Girls are not allowed to receive a secondary school or university education. Most female government employees have been ordered to stay home, and female aid workers are forbidden from joining humanitarian groups. Women cannot visit public places, such as parks, gyms and bathhouses, and undertaking long road trips requires the presence of a male guardian.

The restrictions on women are a primary deterrent for Afghans sheltering in Pakistan — particularly women and girls — from returning to their homeland, according to displaced family members.
…

India’s moon lander and rover, which made a historic landing on the south pole of the moon, have not “woken up” after being put in sleep mode earlier this month to survive the freezing lunar night temperatures.

Scientists at the Indian Space Research Organization have not succeeded in reestablishing communication with the Vikram lander and the Pragyan rover, which were part of India’s pioneering Chandrayaan-3 mission.

After the spacecraft soft-landed on the little-explored lunar south pole on Aug. 23 — five days after a Russian spacecraft on an identical mission crashed — the rover spent 10 days traveling more than 100 meters on the lunar surface gathering scientific data.

Tasked with “the pursuit of lunar secrets” by the ISRO, the spacecraft transmitted images and scientific data back to Earth and confirmed the presence of sulfur, iron, titanium and oxygen on the moon.

Before the sun set on the moon Sept. 2, ISRO scientists switched the rover to sleep mode to hibernate and protect the spacecraft’s sensitive components from the freezing lunar night conditions. The lander was switched to sleep mode on Sept. 4.

A lunar day and night each lasts a little over 14 Earth days. During the lunar night, the temperature on the moon can drop between minus 200 degrees Celsius and minus 250 degrees Celsius.

After switching the lander and rover to sleep mode, ISRO said in a statement that the rover had completed its first set of assignments — Chandrayaan-3 mission’s primary goal — and they were confident the spacecraft could survive the extreme lunar night.

The ISRO said that after the spacecraft reawakened Friday, the sun would shine on its solar panels, and its batteries would recharge. The agency also said that if the spacecraft did not reawaken it would “forever stay there as India’s lunar ambassador.”

In a Friday post on X, formerly known as Twitter, the ISRO scientists explained their attempts to reawaken the robotic explorers.

“Efforts have been made to establish communication with the Vikram lander and Pragyan rover to ascertain their wake-up condition. As of now, no signals have been received from them. Efforts to establish contact will continue,” ISRO said, raising doubts about whether communication with the spacecraft would be reestablished and the mission’s scientific exploration of the lunar surface would be resumed.

In its latest update on Chandrayaan-3, ISRO said it would continue attempting to make contact with the spacecraft at least until the lunar night begins Oct. 6.

The Chandrayaan-3 mission made India the fourth country in the world to land on the moon, and the first to reach the south pole region. The achievement, hailed as “a victory cry of a new India” by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, sparked a feeling of national pride among millions of Indians, who watched the touchdown of the spacecraft live on television. 
…

In a small workshop in the bustling northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, a dozen Afghan women sit watching a teacher show them how to make clothes on a sewing machine.

The skills center was set up last year by Peshawar resident Mahra Basheer, 37, after seeing the steady influx of people from neighboring Afghanistan where they face an economic crisis and growing restrictions on women since the Taliban took over in 2021.

Trying to create options for women to become financially independent, she opened the workshop to teach tailoring as well as digital skills and beauty treatments. Basheer quickly found hundreds of women enrolling and has a long waitlist.

“If we get assistance, I think we will be able to train between 250 and 500 students at one time, empowering women who can play an important role in the community,” Basheer said.

Officials say hundreds of thousands of Afghans have traveled to Pakistan since foreign forces left and the Taliban took over in 2021. Even before then, Pakistan hosted some 1.5 million registered refugees, one of the largest such populations in the world, according to the United Nations refugee agency.

More than a million others are estimated to live there unregistered. Grappling with an economic crisis of its own, Pakistan’s government is increasingly anxious about the number of Afghans arriving, officials say. Lawyers and officials have said scores of Afghans have been arrested in recent months on allegations they don’t have the correct legal documents to live in Pakistan.

Basheer said that her main focus was expanding operations for Afghan women and she has also included some Pakistani women in the program to boost their opportunities in the conservative area. Once graduating from the three-month course, the women are focused on earning a modest but meaningful income, often starting their own businesses.

Nineteen-year-old Afghan citizen Fatima who had undertaken training at the center, said she now wanted to open a beauty parlor in Peshawar – currently banned in her home country just a few hours away.

“Right now, my plan is to start a salon at home. Then to work very professionally so that I can eventually open a very big salon for myself,” she said.
…

European maritime companies are ditching their old ships for scrap on Bangladesh beaches in dangerous and polluting conditions that have killed workers pulling them apart, Human Rights Watch said Thursday.

Bangladesh’s southeastern Sitakunda beaches have emerged as one of the world’s largest shipbreaking yards, fueling the South Asian country’s booming construction industry and its need for cheap sources of steel.

European firms are among the shipping companies to have sent 520 vessels to the site since 2020, where thousands of workers take apart ships without protective gear.

“Companies scrapping ships in Bangladesh’s dangerous and polluting yards are making a profit at the expense of Bangladeshi lives and the environment,” said HRW researcher Julia Bleckner. “Shipping companies should stop using loopholes in international regulations and take responsibility for safely and responsibly managing their waste.”

Workers told HRW they used their socks as gloves to avoid burns while cutting through molten steel, covered their mouths with shirts to avoid inhaling toxic fumes, and carried chunks of steel while barefoot.

“Workers described injuries from falling chunks of steel or being trapped inside a ship when it caught fire or pipes exploded,” HRW said in its report, published jointly with Belgian-based NGO Shipbreaking Platform.

At least 62 workers have been killed by accidents in Sitakunda’s shipbreaking yards since 2019, Bangladeshi environmental group Young Power in Social Action has said.

Two workers died last week in separate incidents after falling from partially dismantled ships, police told AFP.

‘Little or no attention to worker safety’

The Bangladesh Ship Breakers Association (BSBA), which represents yard owners, said its members had moved to upgrade safety ahead of a new international convention on safe and environmentally sound scrapping, due to enter into force in 2025.

“We are turning our shipbreaking yards into green yards even though it is expensive,” BSBA president Mohammad Abu Taher told AFP. “We are working on it. We supply protective equipment to workers.”

But Fazlul Kabir Mintu, coordinator for the Danish-funded Occupational Safety and Security Information Center, said yard owners operated in a “climate of impunity” because of their outsized influence in local politics.

“There is little or no attention to worker safety in dozens of yards,” he told AFP.

‘Living in misery’

Many ships sent to Sitakunda contained asbestos, said Ripon Chowdhury, executive director of the OSHE Foundation charity that works with shipbreaking laborers.

Asbestos is associated with lung cancer and other life-threatening diseases, but Chowdhury told AFP that workers were forced to mop it up with their bare hands.

He added that his organization had studied 110 shipbreaking workers for exposure to the toxic substance, finding that 33 had tested positive.

“All 33 workers were victims of varying degrees of lung damage,” he said. “Of the victims, three have died, while others are living in misery.”
…

Azerbaijan on Wednesday arrested the former head of Nagorno-Karabakh’s separatist government as he tried to flee into Armenia following Azerbaijan’s military offensive in the region.

Azerbaijan’s border guard service announced the arrest of Ruben Vardanyan, showing the nation’s intention to firmly maintain control of the Nagorno-Karabakh region after Azerbaijan’s military seized the region from ethnic Armenian control.

Vardanyan was escorted to Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku, and handed over to “relevant state bodies,” where his fate will be decided, according to Azerbaijan’s State Border Service.

Vardanyan made his fortune in Russia as the owner of a major investment bank. He moved to Nagorno-Karabakh in 2022 and served as the region’s head of government until he stepped down earlier this year.

Vardanyan’s had sought to join the thousands of ethnic Armenians leaving the Nagorno-Karabakh region this week. Armenian officials report that upwards of 47,000 of the region’s 120,000 Armenians have left for Armenia.

Watch Heather Murdock’s report:

The exodus is driven by fears of retaliation by Azerbaijan after its military forced leaders of the enclave to lay down their weapons and discuss reintegration into Azerbaijan.

“We are leaving because Azerbaijanis have come to drive us from our homeland,” said Grigory Sarkisyan, who lost his son in the fighting.

The Azerbaijan military offensive has been a bloody one, as Azerbaijan’s Health Ministry reported a total of 192 Azerbaijani troops and one civilian killed and 511 wounded.

Nagorno-Karabakh officials had said earlier that at least 200 people, including 10 civilians, were killed, and more than 400 were wounded in the fighting.

The primarily Muslim country of Azerbaijan has said it wants to peacefully reintegrate the Armenians and will guarantee their civic rights, including to practice their Christian religion.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
…

At least 50,000 people have fled from their homes in Nagorno-Karabagh into Armenia this week. The exodus comes after the long conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan appears to have ended swiftly in Baku’s favor. VOA’s Heather Murdock reports from Armenia, near the border with Nagorno-Karabakh.
…

The Indian side of Kashmir is seeing more female authors emerge in the Indian side of Kashmir. Muheet Ul Islam has more from Srinagar. Camera, video edit: Wasim Nabi
…

Afghanistan’s Taliban says it has captured 200 suspected militants for staging deadly cross-border attacks against Pakistan and has implemented other “concrete steps” to “neutralize” the terrorist activity, VOA learned from Pakistani officials privy to the process.

The de facto Afghan rulers shared the details about the crackdown on the outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, in bilateral talks they hosted last week in Kabul with a high-level delegation from Islamabad.

The dialogue came two weeks after hundreds of heavily armed militants assaulted two Pakistani security posts in the northern border district of Chitral. The September 6th raid killed four soldiers and 12 assailants, with the TTP claiming responsibility.

The Taliban “arrested 200 TTP cadres returning from the Chitral attack. They are now behind bars,” said an official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly interact with the media. He added that de facto Afghan authorities were in the process of relocating other TTP members away from the border with Pakistan.

“But we have to wait and see the outcome of these steps before drawing any conclusions. So, you have to give them some time to consolidate these measures,” the official remarked.

The Taliban did not immediately react to the reported TTP crackdown.

Monday, the Taliban’s chief spokesman reiterated that his government does not allow anyone to use Afghan soil against Pakistan.

“This is our stated policy. This is central to Afghanistan’s national interest in promoting peace and reconciliation,” Zabihullah Mujahid said in comments aired by Taliban-run state television.

“We can only help Pakistan with its internal security issues according to our capacity. Pakistanis also understand our limitations; we cannot help them at borders because that is their responsibility,” Mujahid stated.

Pakistan’s special representative on Afghanistan, Asif Durrani, led the delegation to Kabul, with senior military officials also accompanying him. Officials in Islamabad at the time described as “promising” their “extensive” discussions with Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and his team.

“We are not here to judge the intentions of that de facto government,” Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar, the caretaker Pakistani prime minister, told a Turkish television channel Monday when asked whether the Taliban were sincere in their intentions to curb TTP activities on Afghan soil.

“Yes, we have a concern because groups like TTP do reside on Afghan soil. There are training camps on their soil, which is a point of concern for us. But whether it is intentional [or] enjoys the patronage of that government remains to be seen. We don’t want to complicate that relationship,” Kakar stated.

The TTP, known as the Pakistani Taliban, is designated a global terrorist organization by Pakistan, the United States. and the United Nations.

The militant group emerged in Pakistan’s border areas in 2007, pledging allegiance to the leadership of the Afghan Taliban and supporting them in mounting insurgent attacks on U.S.-led NATO troops in Afghanistan until the foreign forces withdrew in August 2021after nearly two decades in the country.

Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada has forbidden his forces from launching cross-border attacks against Pakistan, calling them haram or un-Islamic.

Akhundzada has also ordered Afghans not to collaborate with or give donations to the TTP for its so-called jihad against Pakistan and barred the militants from running donation collection campaigns in Afghanistan, Pakistani officials with knowledge of the recent discussions in Kabul told VOA.

Pakistani officials said following the TTP attack in Chitral that scores of Afghan fighters had also participated in it, and the evidence was promptly shared with Kabul authorities to demand action against them. An internal TTP communication later emerged on social media, warning its fighters against recruiting Afghans into their ranks, suggesting the group had come under pressure from the Taliban government.

Officials in Islamabad, while sharing their assessment with VOA, believe that the Taliban are “consciously distancing” themselves from groups aligned with them during the insurgency but which are now involved in criminal activities in Afghanistan, such as extortion, kidnapping for ransom, and terrorism.

They remarked that Taliban leaders know they have a greater responsibility to address these issues because they are now in control of the country and must demonstrate to the world that they no longer act like an insurgent group as they seek recognition for their government.
…

Anti-Muslim hate speech incidents in India averaged more than one a day in the first half of 2023 and were seen most in states with upcoming

elections, according to a report by Hindutva Watch, a Washington-based group monitoring attacks on minorities.

There were 255 documented incidents of hate speech gatherings targeting Muslims in the first half of 2023, the report found. There was no comparative data for prior years.

It used the United Nations’ definition of hate speech as “any form of communication… that employs prejudiced or discriminatory language towards an individual or group based on attributes such as religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, color, descent, gender, or other identity factors.”

About 70% of the incidents took place in states scheduled to hold elections in 2023 and 2024, according to the report.

Maharashtra, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Gujarat witnessed the highest number of hate speech gatherings, with Maharashtra accounting for 29% of such incidents, the report found. The majority of the hate speech events mentioned

conspiracy theories and calls for violence and socio-economic boycotts against Muslims.

About 80% of those events took place in areas governed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is widely expected to win the general elections in 2024.

Hindutva Watch said it tracked online activity of Hindu nationalist groups, verified videos of hate speeches posted on social media and compiled data of isolated incidents reported by media.

Modi’s government denies the presence of minority abuse. The Indian embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

Rights groups allege mistreatment of Muslims under Modi, who became prime minister in 2014.

They point to a 2019 citizenship law described as “fundamentally discriminatory” by the United Nations human rights office for excluding Muslim migrants; an anti-conversion

legislation challenging the constitutionally protected right to freedom of belief, and the 2019 revoking of Muslim-majority Kashmir’s special status.

There has also been demolition of Muslim properties in the name of removing illegal construction and a ban on wearing the hijab in classrooms in Karnataka when the BJP was in power in that state.
…

A fire that raced through a hall hosting a Christian wedding in northern Iraq killed at least 100 people and injured 150 others, authorities said Wednesday, warning the death toll could rise.

The fire happened in Iraq’s Nineveh province in its Hamdaniya area, authorities said. That’s a predominantly Christian area just outside of the city of Mosul, some 335 kilometers northwest of the capital, Baghdad.

Television footage showed flames rushing over the wedding hall as the fire took hold. In the blaze’s aftermath, only charred metal and debris could be seen as people walked through the scene of the fire, the only light coming from television cameras and the lights of onlookers’ mobile phones.

Survivors arrived at local hospitals, receiving oxygen and bandaged, as their families milled through hallways and outside as workers organized more oxygen cylinders.

The health department in Nineveh province raised the death toll to 114. Health Ministry spokesman Saif al-Badr earlier put the number of injured at 150 via the state-run Iraqi News Agency.

“All efforts are being made to provide relief to those affected by the unfortunate accident,” al-Badr said.

Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani ordered an investigation into the fire and asked the country’s Interior and Health officials to provide relief, his office said in a statement online.

Najim al-Jubouri, the provincial governor of Nineveh, said some of the injured had been transferred to regional hospitals. He cautioned there were no final casualty figures yet from the blaze, which suggests the death toll still may rise.

There was no immediate official word on the cause of the blaze but initial reports by the Kurdish television news channel Rudaw suggested fireworks at the venue may have sparked the fire.
…

Members of the United Nations Security Council, except Russia and China, on Tuesday issued a resounding condemnation of the Taliban’s relentless persecution of women in Afghanistan, calling on all member states to take urgent action to hold the country’s leadership accountable.

The U.N. Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, Roza Otunbayeva, said since seizing power in 2021, the Taliban have issued over 50 decrees with the explicit aim of erasing women from public life.

The decrees have included the closure of secondary education for women, including universities, the prohibition of women’s entry into entertainment and sports facilities, the total exclusion of women from government, and the denial of most jobs for women.

Sima Bahous, executive director of U.N. Women, told the same meeting that the Islamist government has imposed extreme patriarchal gender norms that flagrantly deny women their basic human rights.

Afghan women “tell us that they are prisoners living in darkness, confined to their homes without hope for the future,” said Bahous.

Karima Bennoune, an international human rights expert, urged the United Nations to officially recognize and codify the gender apartheid system that has taken hold in Afghanistan.

“A powerful aspect of the gender apartheid approach is that [it] not only implicates the perpetrators of apartheid, but it means, as was the case with racial apartheid in South Africa, that no member state can be complicit in or normalize the Taliban’s illegal actions and that they must take effective action to end this situation,” Bennoune told the Security Council meeting.

Codifying gender apartheid in international laws, Bennoune said, would make it clear that there can be no recognition of the Taliban government by any member state, and that the country should not be granted a seat at the U.N.

Hundreds of Afghan women who participated in a U.N. survey in July voiced a similar sentiment, saying that any recognition of the Taliban government should be contingent on concrete improvements in women’s rights, including access to education and the ability to work.

Despite the Taliban’s ban on Afghan women working for U.N. agencies and nongovernmental organizations, Special Representative Otunbayeva emphasized the importance of continuing diplomatic engagement with the Taliban.

“Dialogue is not recognition,” she said. “Engagement is not acceptance of these policies. On the contrary: dialogue and engagement are how we are attempting to change these policies.”

No Condemnation by Russia, China

Calling the Taliban’s policies abhorrent and unacceptable, nearly all council members, except for Russia and China, demanded that Taliban leaders end their misogynistic policies.

In her remarks to council members, Anna Evstigneeva, deputy Russian representative to the U.N., said that “we closely listened” to the statements made by the head of U.N. Women and Bennoune, but she did not condemn the Taliban policies.

Instead, she used the platform to criticize the United States and NATO for their two-decade-long war in Afghanistan and their subsequent abandonment of the country, leaving it mired in humanitarian crises.

“We are keen to develop relations with Kabul,” said Evstigneeva, adding that a Taliban delegation, along with representatives from Indonesia, Turkey and several regional countries, have been invited to a meeting about Afghanistan in Kazan, Russia, on Friday.

A Chinese representative went as far as to urge Taliban authorities to respect the rights of Afghan women and form an inclusive government.

China recently appointed a new ambassador to Kabul.

Chinese companies have also signed mining contracts with the Taliban government.
…

Authorities in northwestern Pakistan said Tuesday that a counterterrorism operation resulted in the arrest of four regional Islamic State-affiliated operatives.

The area’s counterterrorism department said the operation was carried out in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. 

It identified the detainees as Afghan nationals associated with Islamic State-Khorasan, or IS-K. The statement said that the men plotted attacks in the city, targeting members of religious minorities and security forces. 

IS-K took credit for a suicide bombing of a minority Shiite mosque in Peshawar in January of this year, killing nearly 100 worshipers. 

Tuesday’s arrests came hours after the military said its forces had raided a suspected “terrorist” hideout near the Afghan border and killed three militants in the ensuing clashes. 

A key militant commander was said to be among those killed in the pre-dawn raid in the Khyber border district, a former stronghold of the outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. 

The group, known as the Pakistani Taliban, routinely carries out attacks against security forces, mainly in districts lining the border with Afghanistan and elsewhere in Pakistan.

Stepped up attacks by the TTP and other insurgent groups in Pakistan this year have killed hundreds of people, mostly members of the security forces. The military has confirmed the deaths of at least 220 soldiers.

Pakistan says the TTP operates out of bases in Afghanistan and the Taliban takeover of the neighboring country two years ago has emboldened the militants to intensify cross-border terrorism, allegations de facto Afghan authorities reject. 

“We have a concern because groups like TTP do reside on Afghan soil. There are training camps on their soil, which is a concern for us,” Pakistani caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Kakar said in an interview aired on Monday. 

“But whether it is all intentional, does it enjoy the patronage of that government, that remains to be seen,” he told the Turkish TRT channel.
…

As Bangladesh moves toward the next national elections — likely to be held in January — opposition political parties are accusing the country’s security forces of an escalation in repression.

Hundreds of thousands of leaders, activists and supporters of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), the country’s largest opposition party, have faced “fictitious” charges of violence, party leaders allege.

“Every prospective BNP general election candidate has at least dozens of cases filed against him by the police or members of the ruling party,” AKM Wahiduzzaman, the BNP’s information and technology affairs secretary, told VOA.

The Awami League is the ruling party in Bangladesh.

“These ghost cases are mostly intended to keep the BNP leaders and workers away from election-related activities,” Wahiduzzaman said. “The cases are also aimed at getting the prospective BNP election candidates convicted by the court and disqualified for election. The government is resorting to all means to keep BNP away from election.”

The 2014 elections were boycotted by the BNP, and the 2018 elections were marred by widespread allegations of massive vote stuffing — a charge that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has repeatedly denied. BNP leaders and other critics say they fear the Awami League will rig the next election.

For months, the BNP and other opposition parties have organized political rallies and demanded Hasina’s resignation to make way for a nonpartisan caretaker government ahead of the next election. Hasina’s government has not accepted the demand.

BNP leaders allege their political rallies are being attacked by the police and armed Awami League activists, and that their leaders and supporters are being set up on spurious charges of violence and sabotage.

According to the office of the BNP, between 2009 and July 2023, more than 138,000 cases were filed against more than 4 million leaders and activists of the BNP and its member organizations.

Disqualified from the election

BNP joint Secretary General Habib Un Nabi Khan Sohel, accused in more than 450 cases, told VOA on Monday that he was in court daily.

“For the past three months, I have been in court from morning to evening, attending hearings of four to six cases every day. Many of my senior party colleagues are facing identical situations in court,” said Sohel, who was arrested by a court in a violence-related case and barred from contesting the 2018 general elections.

Trials of about a dozen cases against him have been fast-tracked, and he said he fears being convicted and disqualified as an election candidate.

At least 44 senior BNP leaders have been sent to jail, Wahiduzzaman said.

“In politically influenced courts, over 200 cases against senior BNP leaders have been fast-tracked. All these trials are aimed to get the accused BNP leaders convicted in coming weeks and disqualify them from the next election,” he said.

Bangladeshi pro-democracy activist Pinaki Bhattacharya, who is in exile in France, said Hasina has long used judicial cases based “on trumped-up charges” to keep her opponents away from general elections.

“The Bangladesh police filed many cases accusing opposition political activists of bombing different places. Later inquiries by media, private fact-finders and pro-democracy activists revealed that no bombing had taken place there at all. They even filed cases against dead people, accusing them of committing violence on the street,” Bhattacharya, a popular YouTuber, told VOA.

“The police filed cases on trumped-up charges targeting senior opposition leaders before the 2018 general elections. They are repeating the same mischievous strategy this time so that the opposition parties cannot take part in the next elections freely.”

Mohammad Faruk Hossain, spokesperson for the Dhaka Metropolitan Police, told VOA that the police “never” lodge what is being called a “ghost case.”

“The police file a case against one only when it is found that the person has been involved in criminal activities. They [the opposition activists] are indulging in vandalism and arson in the name of political activities. They are also assaulting the police,” Hossain said.

“The cases are being filed against them according to law because they are resorting to violence. Our force always works within the legal frame,” he said.

Free and fair elections

Since 2022, the United States and other countries have been urging the Hasina government to hold the next general election in a free and fair manner.

Last week, Washington announced it was “taking steps to impose visa restrictions” on Bangladeshi individuals who are found complicit in “undermining the democratic electoral process” in Bangladesh.

These individuals include “current and former Bangladeshi officials, members of the opposition and ruling political parties, and members of law enforcement, the judiciary, and security services” and “members of their immediate family,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in an announcement on September 22.

Hasina, in the United States for the United Nations General Assembly, said in a New York press conference in New York that if “any foreign country conspired to sabotage” the election in Bangladesh, people in her country would “impose sanctions” on that nation.

“It was the people of Bangladesh who voted our party to power. We indeed want the elections in Bangladesh to be free and fair,” Hasina said.

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said Hasina’s government and party have already prepared a blueprint laying out how they will use the ruling party cadres and civil and police administration to conduct the election.

“Some days ago, the district commissioner of Jamalpur urged people openly to vote for the ruling party. In a leaked telephone conversation, the officer in charge of a police station in Rajshahi was overheard saying he had been recently posted there by a minister to ensure that the ruling party candidate won the next election,” Alamgir told VOA.

“This is clear that the government is preparing to massively rig the next election again. If we take part in such an election, it would be like supporting a big crime,” Alamgir said.
…

Sitting in a row as the sun beats down, more than a dozen men fish from a small peninsula that has emerged along the Jhelum, one of the major rivers in Indian Kashmir.

From heavy rains and flash floods earlier this year to a heat wave in September that saw temperatures in the Kashmir Valley hit peaks not seen in more than a century, the impact of the extremes of climate change are surfacing, sometimes in unexpected places.

“I had never set foot on the riverbed before. This is the first time all of us are witnessing the lowest water level of the Jhelum,” said Mushtaq Ahmad Dar, a local produce salesman. “People are engaging in various activities on the exposed surface of the river that looked threatening a few months ago.”

Three months ago, the Jhelum’s banks expanded beyond its capacity due to excessive rainfall until the last week of May. The continuous rise of the river’s water level then created panic among residents who worried that the region might see extreme flooding similar to summer 2014 when hundreds were killed and nearly a million were displaced.

Dar said that after the floods in June and July, it was like the sun was reborn in August and September.

“Rivers, canals and streams have dried up,” he said, adding that Kashmir now needs more rain.

The absence of rainfall and the heat wave caused a scarcity of water in different parts of the valley, including some areas of the capital city, Srinagar. People from multiple villages through the Kashmir Valley collected contaminated water to drink.

“Our area already faces [a] shortage of drinking water, but this year, our problem multiplied as we faced [an] acute water shortage. We collected contaminated water from a stream and utilized it for consumption,” Farooq Ahmad, a resident of the Nasirpora area of Budam district, told VOA.

“The water from the stream was filtered and later on boiled so that we can consume it,” he said, adding that villagers requested the Jal Shakti Department — a government agency that ensures a clean water supply for drinking and irrigation purposes — to send water tankers to the village. “But no one cared.”

In a recent interview with the English daily newspaper Greater Kashmir, Ashok Kumar Gandotra, chief engineer of the Jal Shakti Department, admitted that local residents are facing a drinking water crisis.

“Most of the sources, including the mighty River Jhelum, have almost dried up,” Gandotra said. “People are facing a crisis. When there is a problem in the source, how can there be no problem?” he said, adding that the department is trying to meet the requirement by supplying water through tankers where there is acute storage.

Aijaz Rasool, an environmentalist, attributes the rise in temperature in the Himalayan region to climate change and global warming. He noted that in September, the Kashmir Valley recorded its second hottest day for that month in 132 years, when the temperature rose to 34.2 degrees Celsius on September 12. Average temperatures in September are typically between 24 and 28 degrees Celsius.

“Kashmir is located between two Himalayan ranges — the Karakoram on the Afghanistan side and the Hindukush on the Indian side — and both regions are experiencing the impact of climate change and global warming,” Rasool told VOA. “Glaciers are melting, rivers and streams are drying up, and our water reservoirs are getting depleted. As a result, our valley is suffering on multiple fronts.”

Rasool said developed and developing countries must find a way to collaborate to combat climate change and global warming. The 2015 Paris Agreement set a goal to limit the increase of global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius. According to the United Nations World Meteorological Organization, temperatures between June and August of this year were the hottest three months ever recorded.

“As far as our region is concerned, each individual has to play a role, along with the government, to save and conserve our water bodies such as lakes, wetlands, rivers and streams, whose hydrological cycle is presently disturbed,” Rasool said. “Jhelum today no longer poses the flood risk it did in 2014,” Rasool said, pointing out that current water levels have reached a 70-year low.

Kashmir’s heat wave has also damaged the horticultural and agricultural sectors, especially cash crops such as apples and saffron, considered the backbone of Jammu and Kashmir’s economy.

Khurshid Malik, an apple trader and farmer, told VOA that the drought ruined more than half of his crops. Apples need temperatures to stay between 20 to 30 degrees Celsius in order to maintain perfect color and size.

“If the temperature crosses 30 degrees Celsius, rainfall is a must, otherwise the apples will catch different kinds of diseases, including scab, and the fruit size will be small,” Malik said. “I believe more than 50% of the apple crop has got damaged, which surely will impact the livelihood of many people.”

Sonam Lotus, director of the Meteorological Department of Jammu and Kashmir, told VOA that while the heat wave lasted for 15 days until September 20, relief is on the horizon.

“The lower regions also received rain yesterday, and it is expected that the temperature will decrease in the coming days,” he said.
…

A powerful blast rocked the mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh region Monday evening as ethnic Armenians streamed out of the breakaway territory after the Azerbaijani military reclaimed full control of it in a lightning offensive last week.

The explosion at a fuel storage facility near the regional capital of Stepanakert wounded more than 200 people, Nagorno-Karabakh human rights ombudsman Gegham Stepanyan said on X, formerly known as Twitter. It was not immediately clear what caused the blast, which happened as residents were lining up to get fuel for their cars in order to leave the region.

The majority of the victims were in “severe or extremely severe” condition, Stepanyan said, adding that the victims would need to be airlifted out of the region for medical treatment to save their lives. It was not immediately clear if there were any deaths.

The Azerbaijani military routed Armenian forces in a 24-hour blitz last week, forcing the separatist authorities to agree to lay down weapons and start talks on Nagorno-Karabakh’s “reintegration” into Azerbaijan after three decades of separatist rule.

While Azerbaijan has pledged to respect the rights of ethnic Armenians in the region and restore supplies after a 10-month blockade, many local residents feared reprisals and decided to leave for Armenia.

The Armenian government said that more than 6,500 Nagorno-Karabakh residents had fled to Armenia as of Monday evening. Moscow said that Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno-Karabakh were assisting the evacuation. Some 700 people remained in the peacekeepers’ camp there by Monday night.

Dozens of people were lining up at the fuel facility where the blast occurred because they had been promised fuel — a scarcity during the blockade — for their cars in order to move to Armenia, according to Nagorno-Karabakh’s separatist authorities.

The explosion took place hours after the second round of talks between Azerbaijani officials and separatist representatives was held Monday in the town of Khojaly, just north of the Nagorno-Karabakh capital. The first round of talks was held last week.

Azerbaijan’s presidential office said in a statement that the talks were held “in a constructive atmosphere” and that discussion focused on humanitarian aid to the region and medical services.

Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry said Monday that two of its soldiers were killed a day earlier when a military truck hit a land mine. It didn’t name the area where the explosion occurred.

In an address to the nation Sunday, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said his government was working with international partners to protect the rights and security of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh.

“If these efforts do not produce concrete results, the government will welcome our sisters and brothers from Nagorno-Karabakh in the Republic of Armenia with every care,” he said.

Demonstrators demanding Pashinyan’s resignation over what they call his failure to protect Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh continued to block the Armenian capital’s main avenues Monday, clashing occasionally with police.

Russian peacekeepers have been in the region since 2020, when a Russian-brokered armistice ended a six-week war between Azerbaijan and ethnic Armenian forces in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Pashinyan and many others in Armenia accused the peacekeepers of failing to prevent the hostilities and to protect the Armenian population. Moscow rejected the accusations, arguing that its forces had no legal grounds to intervene, particularly after Pashinyan’s recognition of Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan.

Nagorno-Karabakh came under the control of ethnic Armenian forces, backed by the Armenian military, in separatist fighting that ended in 1994. During the war in 2020, Azerbaijan took back parts of Nagorno-Karabakh along with surrounding territory that Armenian forces had claimed during the earlier conflict.

In December, Azerbaijan imposed a blockade of the only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia, alleging that the Armenian government was using the road for mineral extraction and illicit weapons shipments to the region’s separatist forces.

Armenia charged that the closure denied basic food and fuel supplies to Nagorno-Karabakh’s approximately 120,000 people. Azerbaijan rejected the accusation, arguing the region could receive supplies through the Azerbaijani city of Aghdam — a solution long resisted by Nagorno-Karabakh authorities, who called it a strategy for Azerbaijan to gain control of the region.

On Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron pledged support for Armenia and Armenians, saying that France will mobilize food and medical aid for the population of Nagorno-Karabakh, and keep working toward a “sustainable peace” in the region.

France, which has a big Armenian diaspora, has for decades played a mediating role in Nagorno-Karabakh. A few hundred people rallied outside the French Foreign Ministry over the weekend, demanding sanctions against Azerbaijan and accusing Paris of not doing enough to protect Armenian interests in the region.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in the meantime, visited Azerbaijan on Monday in a show of support to its ally.

Russia has been the main ally and sponsor of Armenia and has a military base there, but it also has sought to maintain friendly ties with Azerbaijan. But Moscow’s clout in the region has waned quickly amid the Russian war in Ukraine while the influence of Azerbaijan’s top ally Turkey has increased.

Meanwhile, the head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, Samantha Power, visited Armenia Monday to “affirm U.S. support for Armenia’s sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity, and democracy and to help address humanitarian needs stemming from the recent violence in Nagorno-Karabakh,” her office said in a statement.
…

Senior Biden administration officials arrived in Armenia on Monday, a day after ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh began fleeing following Azerbaijan’s defeat of the breakaway region’s fighters in a conflict dating from the Soviet era.

The visit by U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) chief Samantha Power and U.S. State Department Acting Assistant Secretary for Europe and Eurasian Affairs Yuri Kim is the first by senior U.S. officials to Armenia since the Karabakh Armenians were forced into a ceasefire last week.

Power will meet with senior Armenian government officials on the trip, first reported by Reuters, and will affirm the U.S. partnership with the country and “express deep concern for the ethnic Armenian population in Nagorno-Karabakh and to discuss measures to address the humanitarian crisis there,” a U.S. official said.

Power will be the first USAID Administrator to go to Armenia, the official added.

“The United States is deeply concerned about reports on the humanitarian conditions in Nagorno-Karabakh and calls for unimpeded access for international humanitarian organizations and commercial traffic,” USAID said in the announcement of the trip.

The Armenians of Karabakh, a territory internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but previously beyond its control, sued for peace last week after a 24-hour military operation by the much larger Azerbaijani military.

The Armenians are not accepting Azerbaijan’s promise to guarantee their rights as the region is integrated. The Nagorno-Karabakh leadership told Reuters the region’s 120,000 Armenians did not want to live as part of Azerbaijan for fear of persecution and ethnic cleansing.

The Armenian government said that as of 5 a.m. on Monday more than 2,900 people had crossed into the country from Nagorno-Karabakh.

Armenia has prepared space for tens of thousands of Armenians from the region, including hotels near the border, though Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan says he does not want them to leave their homes unless it is absolutely necessary.

Thousands of Karabakh Armenians have been left without food.

The Armenian authorities in the region said late on Saturday that about 150 tons of humanitarian cargo from Russia and another 65 tons of flour shipped by the International Committee of the Red Cross had arrived in the region.

Karabakh has been run by a breakaway administration since a war in the early 1990s amid the breakup of the Soviet Union.

In 2020, after decades of skirmishes, Azerbaijan, backed by Turkey, won a 44-day Second Karabakh War, recapturing territory in and around Karabakh. That war ended with a Russian-brokered peace deal that Armenians accuse Moscow of failing to guarantee.
…

A nationally known journalist in Pakistan who disappeared nearly five months ago after being taken into police custody has returned home, his lawyer and police said Monday.

Imran Riaz Khan, often called Imran Riaz, was detained by police at the airport in his native Sialkot city in the central Punjab province on May 11 as he tried to flee the country over fears of his arrest. At the time, authorities accused him of inciting people to violence through his reporting.

In a video message released just before his arrest, Riaz had stated that he was leaving the country because the “space to speak is shrinking” in Pakistan and he was “being forced into silence.”

The Sialkot police early Monday announced on X (formerly Twitter) that the 47-year-old journalist “has been safely recovered” and “he is now with his family.” The police did not share any other details, nor did they explain from where he was recovered.

Riaz’s lawyer later confirmed the journalist’s reunion with his family and posted a picture of him on X.

“It took a lot of time due to the countless challenges” and “a weak judiciary,” the lawyer, Mian Ashfaq Ali, wrote in the local Urdu language.

Ali declined to comment on Riaz’s physical well-being or what he may have experienced while in captivity, saying it was too early to discuss the matter.

“I don’t want to overburden him or add to the traumatic situation he is going through,” Ali told VOA Urdu by phone.

“He has lost 22 kilograms. He needs time to stabilize mentally and physically,” he added. “At this point, his well-being, recovery, and restoration of his old status are more supreme than anything.”

Pakistan’s caretaker government has not immediately commented on Riaz’s release or the circumstances leading to his disappearance.

The journalist was arrested amid a nationwide crackdown on former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s supporters after they allegedly vandalized military properties in different parts of Pakistan during anti-government protests in May.

Riaz was conducting talk shows on the mainstream Pakistani BOL television channel and for his over three million YouTube subscribers until he went missing. He has more than five million followers on X.

The journalist’s family had immediately approached a high court in the provincial capital of Lahore, alleging that police had abducted him. But the police told the court days later that Riaz was freed within 24 hours and not in their custody, strengthening widespread suspicions that the powerful military was behind his abduction.

The military has not commented on the allegations since Riaz went missing.

After repeated hearings into the case, the judge issued a “final warning” last week to the police to locate and produce the missing journalist before the court by Tuesday.

“The release of @ImranRiazKhan is such a positive sign!” said lawyer Khadija Siddiqi, a human rights activist, on X. “Latest modus operandi of brazenly silencing voices of dissent seems to have failed miserably! Citizens of Pakistan must not be antagonized by our own state!”

Pakistani security agencies have long been accused of intimidating and harassing journalists critical of the military for its involvement in politics.

Riaz was a vocal supporter of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and the military. However, after Khan was removed from power in a parliamentary no-confidence motion in April 2022, the journalist started criticizing the military that the deposed prime minister alleged was behind his ouster.

Last week, authorities in the capital, Islamabad, arrested a television anchor, Khalid Jamil, after he posted comments on X that were critical of the military. Jamil faces charges of spreading false information about state institutions on social media.

Global press freedom advocacy groups list Pakistan among the countries declared unsafe for journalists. 

The U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists says that at least 97 media workers and journalists have been killed, primarily for their work in the country since 1992. However, investigations into these cases have not led to any convictions.

Khan’s opposition party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI, hailed Raiz’s release in a prepared statement, saying he was “one of many names who are suffering from enforced disappearances in Pakistan.”

It referred to hundreds of PTI supporters arrested since May and reiterated party demands to free all political prisoners from “illegal incarceration.”

“These are innocent people who are either members & supporters of Pakistan’s largest & only federal party, PTI…, or people who have raised their voices against the unprecedented fascism, utter lawlessness, suspension of constitution & dismantling of democracy in the country,” the statement claimed.

Khan was convicted of corruption charges and sentenced to three years in prison last month. A federal court later suspended the sentence, but authorities refused to release him, saying he is being tried in another case under the country’s so-called Official Secrets Act for leaking state information to the public for political gain.

The former prime minister rejects any wrongdoing, saying the military is behind scores of lawsuits brought against him since his ouster in a bid to block his return to power in next elections, charges government officials deny.
…

The Taliban are creating a large-scale camera surveillance network for Afghan cities that could involve repurposing a plan crafted by the Americans before their 2021 pullout, an interior ministry spokesman told Reuters, as authorities seek to supplement thousands of cameras already across the capital, Kabul.

The Taliban administration — which has publicly said it is focused on restoring security and clamping down on Islamic State, which has claimed many major attacks in Afghan cities — has also consulted with Chinese telecoms equipment maker Huawei about potential cooperation, the spokesman said.

Preventing attacks by international militant groups — including prominent organizations such as Islamic State — is at the heart of the interaction between the Taliban and many foreign nations, including the U.S. and China, according to readouts from those meetings. But some analysts question the cash-strapped regime’s ability to fund the program, and rights groups have expressed concern that any resources will be used to crackdown on protesters.

Details of how the Taliban intend to expand and manage mass surveillance, including obtaining the U.S. plan, have not been previously reported.

The mass camera rollout, which will involve a focus on “important points” in Kabul and elsewhere, is part of a new security strategy that will take four years to be fully implemented, Ministry of Interior spokesman Abdul Mateen Qani told Reuters.

“At the present we are working on a Kabul security map, which is [being completed] by security experts and [is taking] lots of time,” he said. “We already have two maps, one which was made by USA for the previous government and second by Turkey.”

He did not detail when the Turkish plan was made.

A U.S State Department spokesperson said Washington was not partnering” with the Taliban and has “made clear to the Taliban that it is their responsibility to ensure that they give no safe haven to terrorists.”

A Turkish government spokesperson didn’t return a request for comment.

Qani said the Taliban had a “simple chat” about the potential network with Huawei in August, but no contracts or firm plans had been reached.

Bloomberg News reported in August that Huawei had reached “verbal agreement” with the Taliban about a contract to install a surveillance system, citing a person familiar with the discussions.

Huawei told Reuters in September that “no plan was discussed” during the meeting.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said she was not aware of specific discussions but added: “China has always supported the peace and reconstruction process in Afghanistan and supported Chinese enterprises to carry out relevant practical cooperation.”

Electricity cuts, rights concerns

There are over 62,000 cameras in Kabul and other cities that are monitored from a central control room, according to the Taliban. The last major update to Kabul’s camera system occurred in 2008, according to the former government, which relied heavily on Western-led international forces for security.

When NATO-led international forces were gradually withdrawing in January 2021, then-vice president Amrullah Saleh said his government would roll out a huge upgrade of Kabul’s camera surveillance system. He told reporters the $100 million plan was backed by the NATO coalition.

“The arrangement we had planned in early 2021 was different,” Saleh told Reuters in September, adding that the “infrastructure” for the 2021 plan had been destroyed.

It was not clear if the plan Saleh referenced was similar to the ones that the Taliban say they have obtained, nor if the administration would modify them.

Jonathan Schroden, an expert on Afghanistan with the Center for Naval Analyses, said a surveillance system would be “useful for the Taliban as it seeks to prevent groups like the Islamic State … from attacking Taliban members or government positions in Kabul.”

The Taliban already closely monitor urban centers with security force vehicles and regular checkpoints.

Rights advocates and opponents of the regime are concerned enhanced surveillance might target civil society members and protesters.

Though the Taliban rarely confirm arrests, the Committee to Protect Journalists says at least 64 journalists have been detained since the takeover. Protests against restrictions on women in Kabul have been broken up forcefully by security forces, according to protesters, videos and Reuters witnesses.

Implementing a mass surveillance system “under the guise of ‘national security’ sets a template for the Taliban to continue its draconian policies that violate fundamental rights,” said Matt Mahmoudi from Amnesty International.

The Taliban strongly denies that an upgraded surveillance system would breach the rights of Afghans. Qani said the system was comparable with what other major cities utilize and that it would be operated in line with Islamic Sharia law, which prevents recording in private spaces.

The plan faces practical challenges, security analysts say.

Intermittent daily power cuts in Afghanistan mean cameras connected to the central grid are unlikely to provide consistent feeds. Only 40% of Afghans have access to electricity, according to the state-owned power provider.

The Taliban also have to find funding after a massive economic contraction and the withdrawal of much aid following their takeover.

The administration said in 2022 that it has an annual budget of over $2 billion, of which defense spending is the largest component, according to the Taliban army chief.

Militancy risks

The discussion with Huawei occurred several months after China met with Pakistan and the Taliban’s acting foreign minister, after which the parties stressed cooperation on counterterrorism. Tackling militancy is also a key aspect of the 2020 troop-withdrawal deal the United States struck with the Taliban.

China has publicly declared its concern over the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), an armed separatist organization in its western Xinjiang region. Security officials and U.N. reports say ETIM likely has a small number of fighters in Afghanistan. ETIM couldn’t be reached for comment.

The Islamic State has also threatened foreigners in Afghanistan.

Its fighters attacked a hotel popular with Chinese businesspeople last year, which left several Chinese citizens wounded. A Russian diplomat was also killed in one of its attacks.

The Taliban denies that militancy threatens their rule and say Afghan soil will not be used to launch attacks elsewhere.

They have publicly announced raids on Islamic State cells in Kabul.

“Since early 2023, Taliban raids in Afghanistan have removed at least eight key [Islamic State in Afghanistan] leaders, some responsible for external plotting,” said U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West at a Sept. 12 public seminar.

A July U.N. monitoring report said there were up to 6,000 Islamic State fighters and their family members in Afghanistan.

Analysts say urban surveillance will not fully address their presence.

The Afghan “home base” locations of Islamic State fighters are in the eastern mountainous areas, said Schroden. “So while cameras in the cities may help prevent attacks … they’re unlikely to contribute much to their ultimate defeat.”
…

At least 30 people were injured when a freight train and a passenger train collided in eastern Pakistan early Sunday.

Authorities say an investigation has been launched and that one train’s driver, his assistant and two other workers have been suspended following the collision.

Railway official Shahid Aziz said the incident happened in Shaikhupura district near Qila Sattar Shah station.  He said most of the injured passengers had been treated at the train station and those with more serious injuries had been transported to hospitals.

Railway crashes are common in Pakistan because of railways’ aging infrastructure.
…

The first gold medals at the Asian Games were all won by host nation China on Sunday in rowing, shooting and wushu after President Xi Jinping opened the two-week multisport extravaganza in a colorful ceremony.

China claimed the first gold when Zou Jiaqi and Qiu Xiuping dominated the women’s lightweight double sculls rowing final to kick off an expected medal rush for the hosts in Hangzhou.

The Chinese pair finished in 7 minutes 6.78 seconds, with Uzbekistan’s Luizakhon Islamova and Malika Tagmativa taking silver, almost 10 seconds behind.

“I am very excited as it’s my first Asian Games,” said Zou, clutching her gold medal.

“Stepping on to the podium today is a new starting point to help us prepare for next year’s Paris Olympics,” said Qiu.

Indonesia’s Chelsea Corputty and Rahma Mutiara Putri won bronze at the Fuyang Water Sports Centre.

The hosts then doubled up on the rowing lake as the men’s lightweight double sculls gold was won by Fan Junjie and Sun Man, who finished five seconds clear of India’s Arjun Lal Jat and Arvind Singh.

Uzbekistan’s Shakhzod Nurmatov and Sobirjon Safaroliyev took bronze.

China’s shooters made it a golden hat-trick soon after when they claimed the women’s 10 meter team air rifle.

China’s perfect start continued as Sun Peiyuan won the first martial arts gold.

Sun successfully defended his men’s changquan wushu title from 2018, ahead of Indonesia’s Edgar Xavier Marvelo, with Macau’s Song Chi-Kuan third.

“I feel very happy to win the gold medal in China, near my home town,” said Sun. “I’m so very excited, I’m lost for words.”

Medals are up for grabs in nine sports on day one of the 19th Asian Games, with China expected to top the overall medals table by the time the action closes on Oct. 8.

Swimming to make splash

Swimming is one of the highlights of the Games and will see seven finals later on Sunday at the Hangzhou Olympic Centre Aquatic Sports Arena, where China is also expected to dominate.

Tokyo Olympic gold medalist Zhang Yufei will defend her title for China in the 200 meter butterfly.

Breakout Chinese freestyler Pan Zhanle faces a fellow young starlet, Korean sensation Hwang Sun-woo, in one of the blue-riband events, the men’s 100 meter.

And Chinese Olympic men’s 200 meter individual medley champion Wang Shun will be looking to bounce back after failing to make the final in the recent world championships in Fukuoka, Japan.

Women’s cricket giants India and Pakistan are both in semifinal action on Sunday with Bangladesh and Sri Lanka respectively standing in their way of reaching Monday’s final in the Twenty20 competition.

Other sports beginning their campaigns on Sunday include boxing, rugby sevens, hockey and the wildly popular eSports — where superstars such as South Korea’s “Faker” are expected to draw capacity crowds for its debut as a full Asian Games medal event.

President Xi officially opened the Games on Saturday night after a delay of a year because of China’s now-abandoned zero-COVID-19 policy.

With more than 12,000 competitors from 45 nations and territories, the Asian Games has more participants than the Olympics.

They will battle for medals in 40 sports across 54 venues.

Most events take place in Hangzhou, a city of 12 million people near Shanghai, but some sports are being staged in cities as far afield as Wenzhou, 300 kilometers to the south. 
…

Pakistan’s caretaker prime minister said he expects parliamentary elections to take place in the new year, dismissing the possibility that the country’s powerful military would manipulate the results to ensure that jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party doesn’t win.

In an interview Friday with The Associated Press, Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said that it’s the Election Commission that is going to conduct the vote, not the military, and that Khan appointed the commission’s chief at the time, so “why would he turn in any sense of the word against him?”

Pakistan has been in deepening political turmoil since April 2022 when Khan was removed from office following a no-confidence vote in Parliament. He was arrested in early August on corruption charges and sentenced to three years in prison, later suspended although he remains in jail. The country is also facing one of the worst economic crises in its history and recovering from last summer’s devastating floods that killed at least 1,700 people and destroyed millions of homes and farmland.

The commission announced Thursday that the elections would take place during the last week in January, delaying the vote that was to be held in November under the constitution.

Kakar resigned as a senator last month after outgoing Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and opposition leader Raza Riaz chose him as caretaker prime minister to oversee the elections and run the day-to-day affairs until a new government is elected.

He said that when the commission sets an exact election date, his government “will provide all the assistance, financial, security or other related requirements.”

Asked whether he would recommend judges overturn Khan’s conviction so he could run in the elections, the prime minister said he wouldn’t interfere with decisions by the judiciary. He stressed that the judiciary should not be used “as a tool for any political ends.”

“We are not pursuing anyone on a personal vendetta,” Kakar said. “But yes, we will ensure that the law is appropriate. Anyone, be it Imran Khan or any other politician who violates, in terms of their political behavior, the laws of the country, then the restoration of the law has to be ensured. We cannot equate that with … political discrimination.”

He said fair elections can take place without Khan or hundreds of members of his party who are jailed because they engaged in unlawful activities, including vandalism and arson, in reference to the violence that rocked the country following Khan’s initial arrest in May. He added that the thousands of people in Khan’s party who didn’t engage in unlawful activities “will be running the political process; they will be participating in the elections.”

The Pakistani military has been behind the rise and fall of governments, with some of Khan’s supporters suggesting that there is de facto military rule in Pakistan and that democracy is under threat.

Kakar, who reportedly has close ties to the military, said those allegations are “part and parcel of our political culture,” to which he pays no attention. He called his government’s working relationship with the military “very smooth,” as well as “very open and candid.”

“We do have challenges of civil-military relationships, I’m not denying that,” he said, but there are very different reasons for the imbalance. He said he believes, after one month leading the government, that civil institutions in Pakistan have “deteriorated in terms of performance for the last many decades,” while the military is disciplined, has organizational capabilities and has improved over the past four decades.

The solution, Kakar said, is to gradually improve the performance of the civilian institutions “rather than weakening the current military organization, because that’s not going to solve any of our problems.”

Conflict in Kashmir

One major problem is Kashmir, which has been a flashpoint for India and Pakistan since the end of British colonial rule in 1947. They have fought two wars over its control.

In 2019, India’s Hindu nationalist government decided to end the Muslim-majority region’s semi-autonomy, stripping it of statehood, its separate constitution and inherited protections on land and jobs.

Kakar said India has sent 900,000 troops to Kashmir and its people are living in “a large imprisonment” with no political rights, in violation of the United Nations Charter’s right to self-determination and the resolution calling for a U.N. referendum.

While the world focuses on Ukraine, he said, Kashmir “is a crisis which primarily has a wrong geography.”

If Kashmir were in Europe or North America, would there still be what he called a “callous attitude” toward resolving it, he asked.

“The most important player in this dispute is the Kashmir people,” Kakar said. “It is neither India or Pakistan” but the Kashmiri people who “have to decide about their identity” and their future.

India boasts of being the largest democracy, he said, but it “is denying the basic, democratic principle to have a plebiscite. … So what sort of a democracy are they boasting about?”
…

Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the COVID-19-delayed 19th Asian Games on Saturday in the city of Hangzhou during a shiny and at times raucous opening ceremony on Saturday.

Spectators in the city’s 80,000-capacity stadium let out a huge roar as Xi was introduced and walked in to sit with visiting dignitaries, including International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The Games, delayed a year because of China’s measures to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, will be the country’s biggest sporting event in over a decade in several metrics, with around 12,000 athletes from 45 nations competing in 40 sports.

After the Chinese flag was brought out, the first team out was Afghanistan, whose female athletes, based abroad due to sport for women being banned by the Taliban, walked together with their male counterparts. Their flag-bearers carried the tricolor flag for Afghanistan which is used by international resistance movements and shunned by the Taliban.

Several teams, including Chinese Taipei, were vocally welcomed by the spectators, but none more so than the home team, whose athletes are expected to dominate the medals table once again.

They also mark a stark contrast to the cheerless Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, which took place under China’s strict zero COVID conditions.

“I feel excited, particularly as a Hangzhou local,” said a man surnamed Zhao on his way into the stadium. “It’s a great chance to show the world how nice our city is. It was … delayed by a year, but that gave us a chance to prepare even better.”

Roads in a sizable “traffic control area” around the city’s Olympic stadium were blocked off, at least one metro station was shut, other Games centers were closed, and deliveries were disrupted on Saturday.

Some locals felt the security measures, always tight when Xi makes a visit, were overdone.

“I think it shows they’re too nervous, right?,” said Hangzhou resident Li Jian. “I think we should be a little more confident.”

One local social media user was told due to safety rules surrounding the Games that a pencil sharpener they had ordered could not be delivered.

“How dangerous is the sharpener?” the user wrote. “Will I be able to use it to kill foreign country leaders?”

Organizers have not disclosed spending on the Games, although the Hangzhou government has said it spent more than $30 billion in the five years through 2020 on transport infrastructure, stadiums, accommodation and other facilities.

Organizers hoped a high-tech opening ceremony on Saturday would help drum up excitement for the Games. Interest at home has been muted as the economy sputters and some question the cost of hosting the mega-event.

Dozens of smiling volunteers greeted journalists arriving in Hangzhou this week, with some expressing relief the event was finally getting started.

The official slogan of the event, “Heart to Heart, @Future,” represents the goal of uniting the people and countries of Asia through these games, officials have said, but geopolitical tensions and rivalries threatened to overshadow that effort this week.

Xi called on the West to lift sanctions on Syria and offered Beijing’s help in rebuilding the war-shattered country on Friday during rare talks with the long-ostracized Syrian leader al-Assad.

Also on Friday, India protested over a visa issue that affected three of its athletes at the games, leading India’s sports minister Anurag Thakur to cancel his trip.

Japan’s top government spokesperson said on Tuesday that Tokyo would do its utmost to ensure the safety of Japanese nationals in China as the release of treated radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea has chilled ties.

“We should promote peace through sports, adhere to the principle of goodwill towards neighbors and mutual benefit and … resist the cold war mentality and confrontation between camps,” Xi told dignitaries at a banquet before the ceremony on Saturday, state news agency Xinhua reported.
…

Allegations by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that India is behind the June killing of a Sikh community leader in Vancouver have placed the nation’s large Indian Canadian community at the center of an escalating diplomatic row.

According to the most recent government statistics, 1.8 million people in Canada, or 5.1% of the population, consider themselves to be of South Asian origin. Just over 770,000 identify themselves as followers of the Sikh religious faith, accounting for more than 2% of the national population. “South Asian” is generally defined as referring to the Indian sub-continent, including present day Pakistan.

Immigration to Canada from the then British-controlled Indian sub-continent started in the late 1800s and has included large numbers of Sikhs. There are estimated to be more than 220,000 followers of the Sikh faith in Greater Vancouver, making up about 8.5% of the metropolitan area’s population.

Reeta Tremblay, who was born in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, is a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Victoria. She says the South Asian community, including Sikh followers, play a huge part in Canada.

“You have lot of entrepreneurial community, even if you look in our Vancouver, you know, in our Vancouver Island, we have very prominent, prominent Sikh community,” she said. “We have lots of prominent non-Sikh Hindus who are in business, in academic sector, professional sectors. So, there’s a huge, you know, there is an influential community.”

This includes Jagmeet Singh, leader of Canada’s New Democratic Party, who is a turban-wearing Sikh.

Attention has been placed on the diaspora since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused India of being behind the June killing in suburban Vancouver of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a prominent Sikh community leader. The Indian government has reacted with warnings about travel to Canada and by halting the issuing of travel visas to Canadians.

Nijjar was a prominent supporter of Khalistan, a proposed separatist sovereign enclave for Sikhs in the current state of Punjab, India.

Dave Hayer, who has lived in suburban Vancouver since immigrating in 1972, has experienced much of the local Sikh community’s recent history.

His father, Tara Singh Hayer, was publisher of the Indo-Canadian Times and was often critical of violence within the local effort to create Khalistan. He was paralyzed by an assassination attempt in 1988 and killed 10 years later.

A former elected member of the provincial legislature, he feels that Trudeau should have provided more evidence before accusing India, but he also says New Delhi is going too far.

“I think the prime minister overdid by what he said, because he should have shown what proof he has, but the senior officials from the RCMP or other law enforcement agencies show what proof they had to say what he was saying,” he said. “I think India is also probably overreacting to the case.”

University of Victoria’s Tremblay recalled that when Trudeau was first elected, he talked about having more Sikh followers in his Cabinet than Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi had in his. The comment that did not go over well with the Indian leader.
…

Senior U.S. officials are upbeat about the prospects for improved relations with Central Asia’s five republics following a first-of-its-kind summit between the region’s leaders and President Joe Biden in New York this week. 

“I think we’ve heard an openness from all our Central Asian colleagues and really a desire for more engagement with the United States,” said Nicholas Berliner, special assistant to the U.S. president and senior director for Russia and Central Asia at the National Security Council.   

Biden “cares about the region,” Berliner said in an interview with VOA after the summit. “And I think if there were any doubts about the level of interest on the part of the United States in Central Asia, hopefully today’s summit has put those to rest.”

The so-called C5+1, a diplomatic platform launched in 2015, had met only at the foreign minister level before this week’s session on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly. But U.S. officials floated the prospect of more heads-of-state meetings in future. 

“I have heard Central Asian leaders say this ought to be a tradition,” said Donald Lu, U.S. assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, who told VOA that the summit could become an annual event.

At the closed-door meeting, Biden sought to balance calls for democracy and respect for human rights with the lure of closer economic and security cooperation, according to Berliner. 

“President Biden’s message to his counterparts was that the United States is ready to partner with you to address security issues, economic, climate and transportation issues, and to address human dimension issues,” he said.   

While Washington understands that the region is unlikely to abandon its close ties to its two powerful neighbors – Russia and China – the American officials said they are eager to offer those countries an alternative vision. 

“We felt this was the right time to do this, and it’s an important signal. It shows the importance and the value that the United States places on our relations with Central Asia,” Berliner said.

Rights issues loom 

Although U.S. officials were enthusiastic about the summit, human rights advocates were more measured. 

“We hope President Biden was fully aware of the harsh reality in Uzbekistan and the rest of the region as he sat down with these authoritarian leaders,” said Jahongir Muhammad, a former Uzbek politician and veteran journalist, who led a demonstration outside the United Nations with dozens of Central Asian immigrants.  

Protesters noted the cases of imprisoned bloggers and missing activists, though VOA witnessed some debate among them about whether Uzbekistan is now freer and more open than under its previous authoritarian ruler, Islam Karimov, who died in 2016.     

Human Rights Watch urged Biden to place human rights at the center of the summit, highlighting politically motivated prosecutions, suppression of free speech, and impunity for torture. 

“While Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has triggered renewed focus on this strategically important, resource-rich region, Biden should not allow this to eclipse urgent human rights concerns,” HRW’s statement on Monday said.

HRW also called out what it described as a lack of justice in Kazakhstan, civil society repression in Kyrgyzstan, a rights crackdown in Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan’s reclusive dictatorship.  

In Uzbekistan, despite President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s call at the General Assembly to respect human rights, the rights group believes Tashkent is “no longer pursuing a political reform agenda.” 

HRW cited Mirziyoyev’s recent reelection without any competition and this year’s constitutional amendments allowing him to remain in power for up to 14 more years. 

HRW also pointed to restrictions on media, prosecutions of bloggers and a “heavy-handed response” to protests that took place in the autonomous region of Karakalpakstan in July 2022, when at least 21 people died. 

Lu said Biden has sought to avoid lecturing other world leaders, including Central Asian leaders, acknowledging that Americans “have seen tremendous challenges in our country with respect to our democracy.” 

He said Biden focused at the C5+1 on how “we can work together” on issues like democracy and human rights. “And what I heard was a very receptive group of five leaders who themselves are looking at reforms in their home countries.”  

“There’s a genuinely positive response when we say we want to be a constructive partner,” Lu said. “If we just lecture other countries, very seldom does that produce a positive response.” 

That response was reflected in the joint statement emerging out of the summit, in which the six leaders reaffirmed their “commitment to working together to promote the rule of law and democratic governance.” They also pledged to protect human rights, including those of women, children and persons with disabilities. 

US commitment questioned 

During a tour of Central Asia this summer, VOA learned that many in the region see America’s engagement as short-term and limited by the whims of the authoritarian governments. U.S. media and civil society initiatives often find themselves under threat because of their push for justice and transparency.    

Lu admitted that Washington faces challenges in the region, yet he remains optimistic. 

“We are a reliable partner. … We’ve offered advice often to new emerging democracies. We’ve offered our assistance to help with economic growth. … That doesn’t always mean that we have gotten along with every government.”  

Like Berliner, Lu expressed confidence in the continuity of the U.S. democratic system as the Biden administration pledges closer cooperation with the region.   

“We want Central Asia to have good relations with its neighbors and the big partners around the world — with Russia, China, the United States,” he said.

“If I were Central Asian, I would say take the best from all of the partners. Cultivate good relations with all of us. And we have something to offer as Americans, but I think the Chinese have something to offer. The Russians have something to offer. Central Asia should pick and choose the best from all of us.”  

Lu confirmed that each of the five Central Asian leaders invited Biden to visit his country. “He spent a lot of time in Afghanistan, he’s visited Pakistan, but he hasn’t visited any of the Central Asian republics, and he’s really eager to do so.”
…