Delegates from the Group of 20 nations arrived in Indian-controlled Kashmir on Monday to participate in a tourism meeting condemned by China and Pakistan, as authorities significantly reduced visibility of the security in the disputed region’s main city. 

The meeting scheduled for later Monday is the first significant international event in Kashmir since New Delhi stripped the Muslim-majority region of semi-autonomy in 2019. Indian authorities hope the meeting will show that the controversial changes have brought “peace and prosperity” to the region. 

The delegates will discuss topics like green tourism and destination management. Side events on ecotourism and the role of films in promoting tourist destinations have also been scheduled. 

On Monday, the region’s main city of Srinagar, appeared calm and the roads clean. Most of the security checkpoints were removed or camouflaged with cubiclelike security posts made of G-20 signages behind which security officials stood. 

Officials said hundreds of officers were specially trained for what they call “invisible policing” for the event. 

Shops in the city center opened earlier than usual after several meetings between trade representatives and security officials. But authorities closed the main road leading to the convention center for civilian traffic and shut many schools in the city. 

Monday’s measures contrasted starkly with the security imposed in the days before the event. A massive security cordon was placed around the venue on the shores of Dal Lake in Srinagar with elite naval commandos patrolling in rubber boats in the water. The city’s commercial center was spruced up, with freshly black-topped roads leading to the lakeside convention center and power poles lit in the colors of India’s national flag. 

“We have the making of a unique meeting,” India’s chief coordinator for the G-20, Harshvardhan Shringla, told reporters Sunday. He said the event will have the highest representation of foreign delegates in comparison to previous tourism meetings India held in the states of West Bengal and Gujarat earlier this year. 

Last week, the U.N. special rapporteur on minority issues, Fernand de Varennes, said the meeting would support a “facade of normalcy” while “massive human rights violations” continue in the region. India’s mission at the U.N. in Geneva rejected the statement as baseless and “unwarranted allegations.” 

India’s tourism secretary, Arvind Singh, told reporters Saturday that the meeting “was not only to showcase its (Kashmir’s) potential for tourism but to also signal globally the restoration of stability and normalcy in the region.” 

The region remains one of the world’s most heavily militarized territories, with hundreds of thousands of Indian troops. In 1989, a violent separatist insurgency erupted in the region that sought independence or a merger with Pakistan. India replied with a brutal counterinsurgency and tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers and rebels have been killed in the conflict. 

India’s crackdown intensified after 2019 when New Delhi took the region under its direct control. Since then, the territory’s people and its media have been largely silenced. Authorities have seized scores of homes and arrested hundreds of people under stringent anti-terror laws. The government says such actions are necessary to stop what it calls a “terror ecosystem.” 

Authorities have also enacted new laws that critics and many Kashmiris fear could transform the region’s demographics. 

The G-20, made up of the world’s largest economies, has a rolling presidency with a different member setting priorities each year. India is steering the group in 2023. 

India has been promoting tourism in Kashmir as a sign of peace since the 2019 decision. But the region, known for rolling Himalayan foothills, has for decades been a major domestic tourist destination. Millions of visitors arrive in Kashmir every year and enjoy a peace kept by ubiquitous security checkpoints, armored vehicles and patrolling soldiers. 

The mainstay of Kashmir’s economy, however, continues to be agriculture; the tourism industry contributes about 7% to the region’s GDP. 

China, with which India is locked in a military standoff along the mostly unmarked border in the Ladakh region, has boycotted the event. Pakistan, which controls a part of Kashmir but, like India, claims the entire territory, has also slammed New Delhi for holding the meeting in Srinagar. 

Both have argued that such meetings can’t be held in disputed territories. 

India has dismissed Pakistan’s criticism, saying that the country is not even a member of the G-20. 
…

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is joining Pacific leaders at a summit in Papua New Guinea Monday as New Delhi seeks to counter China’s influence in the region. 

Papua New Guinea is hosting the third Forum for India-Pacific Islands Cooperation as the United States is seeking to increase Washington’s presence in the Indo-Pacific. It brings together leaders from India, 14 Pacific Island nations as well as Australia and New Zealand.   

Energy supplies, climate change and regional security are expected to be on the agenda. 

Analysts have said the summit is a sign that strategic competition in the region is not just about China and the United States. India wants to foster new trade and political ties, and to give island leaders an alternative to the major powers in Beijing and Washington. 

Paul Barker, executive director of the Institute of National Affairs, an independent think-tank in Papua New Guinea, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp’s AM program that Modi’s visit was designed to enhance his country’s diplomatic influence in the Pacific.   

“India as an alternative international power source, economic source but also a leader in the movement on non-aligned nations over many, many years,” Barker said, “It wants to, sort of, be able to affiliate with many of the voices across the Pacific.”   

Barker also said the United States was increasing its strategic interest in the region in response to China’s regional ambitions. Last year, Beijing signed a defense agreement with Solomon Islands, a near-neighbor to Papua New Guinea. 

U.S. President Joe Biden canceled a visit to Port Moresby because of debt ceiling negotiations back home. 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will attend in his absence and is expected to sign a defense cooperation agreement with the government in Port Moresby.   

The accord could allow for a significant U.S. military presence in Papua New Guinea. A second bilateral pact is expected to allow the U.S. to help the Pacific nation combat illegal fishing and transnational crime. 

University students in Papua New Guinea have demonstrated against the signing of the defense accord with Washington, calling for more transparency from Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape. 

He told reporters Monday that his country had nothing to fear from the agreement, adding that “as we go forward over the next 15 years, we will see U.S. soldiers in our country.”   
…

While the world watched Kabul fall and the Taliban surge back to power in 2021 following the withdrawal of U.S. troops, actor Jennifer Lawrence and producer Justine Ciarrocchi were asking themselves what they could do to support women’s rights. 

“Jen’s first response was to find an Afghan filmmaker and give them a platform,” Ciarrocchi told The Hollywood Reporter. 

They eventually found director Sahra Mani, whose 2019 documentary “A Thousand Girls Like Me” looked at a sexually abused woman’s quest for justice. 

On Sunday, “Bread and Roses,” Mani’s documentary about the daily lives of three women after the Taliban’s resurgence, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in a special screening. 

“This film has a message from women in Afghanistan, a soft message; please be their voice who are voiceless under Taliban dictatorship,” said Mani at the premiere. 

The director said in an interview on the Cannes website that she wanted to show the reality of how drastically life has changed under the Taliban for women, even if filming was difficult. “Now that women can no longer leave the house without the veil, I thought we should tell their stories,” she said. 

The safety of the camera crews and the people filmed was of top priority, said Mani, who currently lives in France. 

“The way in which their lives have changed under the Taliban is an everyday reality for us, it’s life under a dictatorship, a cruel reality we cannot ignore.” 
…

Iran said Sunday that a “terrorist” attack had killed at least six security guards near the border with Pakistan, claiming the assailants were trying to infiltrate Iran. 

The deadly incident happened in the Saravan region in the province of Sistan-Baluchistan, some 1,360 kilometers southeast of the capital Tehran, said the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman in a statement on the government’s website. 

Nasser Kanaani said Iran “condemns the sinister act and expects the Pakistani government… to suppress terrorist groups as soon as possible and to try to improve the security of the common borders” in line with bilateral agreements. He did not elaborate. 

Pakistan denounced Sunday’s attack. A foreign ministry statement in Islamabad expressed condolences to the bereaved families and the Iranian government over the “tragic incident.” It stressed “the need for mutual efforts to eliminate the terrorism on both sides of the border.” 

Iranian state media reported militants involved in the deadly attack were attempting to enter the country illegally and fled the area with casualties.  

There were no immediate claims of responsibility, and Iranian officials did not blame the incident on any group. 

Impoverished, predominately Sunni Muslim Sistan-Baluchistan abuts Pakistan’s natural resources-rich, sparsely populated Baluchistan province. The violence-hit Iranian region also borders Afghanistan, making it a convenient route for drug traffickers and Sunni extremists waging attacks against predominately Shi’ite Iran. 

Islamabad alleges that ethnic Baluch insurgents use sanctuaries on Iranian soil to wage attacks against Pakistani security forces in Baluchistan, also a poverty-stricken region. 

Both countries routinely blame the other for not doing enough to prevent cross-border militant attacks.  

Sunday’s violence came days after Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif traveled to the shared border between the two countries and jointly launched a marketplace and power transmission line.  

Kanaani said the deadly incident of terrorism was a “targeted action” to disrupt efforts aimed at enhancing mutual security and economic cooperation in the wake of the Thursday launches. 

Raisi and Sharif also held a formal meeting on the sidelines of the event, agreeing to enhance border security measures.  

“We have exchanged proposals to make our joint border security mechanism more coherent and robust,” the Pakistani prime minister said after the meeting. He said Islamabad would “take appropriate and effective steps” in the light of proposals shared by Raisi but did not elaborate.  

The new marketplace is one of the six such facilities Islamabad and Tehran are jointly building to create jobs to help thousands of poverty-stricken households living on both sides of the more than 900-kilometer border. The transmission line will export 100-megawatt Iranian electricity to Pakistan.
…

Two pilots were killed Sunday when a U.S.-made military helicopter crashed in the north of Afghanistan, the Taliban’s defense ministry said.

“An MD-530 helicopter of the country’s air force, which was flying from Mazar-e-Sharif airfield towards Samangan, collided with an electricity pylon,” the defense minister tweeted.

In September, a Black Hawk helicopter commandeered by the Taliban government after the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan crashed during a training session in Kabul, killing two pilots and a crew member.

When exiting the country in 2021, the U.S. military left behind billions of dollars’ worth of aircraft, vehicles, weapons and other hardware — much of which it said had been rendered inoperable.

Some helicopters were also flown by former Afghan government forces to Central Asian countries before the Taliban took full control of the country.

The Taliban authorities have managed to repair some aircraft, including helicopters, which are believed to be now flown by pilots from the former government forces.

The regime showcased an array of equipment during a military parade, August 31 last year, when they celebrated the first anniversary of their return to power.
…

Six Iranian border guards were killed in a clash with an unknown armed group trying to enter the country near the Pakistani border, state TV reported Sunday.

The fighting happened in the town of Saravan in the southeastern province of Sistan and Baluchistan, some 1,360 kilometers southeast of the capital Tehran. The report said the militants fled the area with casualties, but did not elaborate.

TV also said two border guards were wounded in the clash. It did not blame the attack on any group and no group immediately claimed responsibility. There were no additional details.

The area is one of the least developed parts of Iran. The relationship between the predominantly Sunni residents of the region and Iran’s Shiite theocracy has long been fraught.

On Thursday, the top leaders of Pakistan and Iran inaugurated the first border market as relations warm between the two countries.

Located in the remote village of Pashin in Pakistan’s southwestern Baluchistan province, the marketplace is the first of six to be constructed along the Pakistan-Iran border under a 2012 agreement signed by the two sides.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi also inaugurated an electricity transmission line, which will provide some of Pakistan’s remote regions with Iranian electricity.
…

As Bangladesh and Myanmar gear up to repatriate about 1,100 Rohingya refugees in a pilot project, rights group Human Rights Watch, or HRW, says conditions in Myanmar’s state of Rakhine are still not favorable for sustainable repatriation of Rohingya refugees.

“Bangladesh and Myanmar are organizing returns of Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh to Myanmar’s Rakhine State without consulting the community or addressing the grave risks to their lives and liberty,” the HRW statement released on May 18 said.

“Donor governments and United Nations experts should call for a halt to any Rohingya repatriation until conditions are in place for safe and sustainable returns.”

One Rohingya refugee, who was in a group that visited Myanmar earlier this month to see the resettlement camps, told VOA that none of the refugees would be willing to live in the detention-like camps authorities have built for the Rohingyas in Rakhine.

The refugee, who does not want to be identified fearing reprisals, said, “None in our Rohingya team is satisfied seeing the situation on the ground in Rakhine. We will not return to Myanmar until the government agrees to accept our conditions, including the return of our full citizenship rights.”

Third repatriation attempt

To escape persecution and violence in Myanmar, minority Rohingya Muslims have for decades fled to neighboring Bangladesh, where more than 1.2 million of them now live, in congested shanty refugee colonies.

After some 750,000 Rohingya crossed over into Bangladesh in 2017 following a brutal military crackdown in Rakhine, international pressure forced Myanmar to agree to take back the Rohingya refugees.

But efforts to repatriate the refugees failed in 2018 and 2019 after they refused to return home, saying they still felt unsafe living in Rakhine and that Myanmar authorities had not accepted their demands, including restoration of their full citizenship rights.

Currently, in a China-backed initiative, Myanmar and Bangladesh are making another effort to restart repatriation of approximately 1,100 Rohingya refugees in a pilot project before the monsoon season begins in June-July.

On May 5, Myanmar and Bangladesh authorities took 20 Rohingya refugees from the Cox’s Bazar refugee camp on a guided tour to Rakhine to see the resettlement facilities built for them.

The refugees who toured Myanmar this month said on their return that they were not in favor of the government-planned repatriation because under current conditions Rakhine is still unsafe for them.

“[The Myanmar officials] didn’t answer our questions about whether we would ever be given back our land,” one of the refugees who toured Myanmar told HRW.

“Rohingya refugees have consistently said they want to go home but only when their security, access to land and livelihoods, freedom of movement and citizenship rights can be ensured,” the HRW statement said.

The refugee who toured Rakhine earlier this month and spoke to VOA privately, noted, “In the resettlement camps, movements of the Rohingyas will be heavily restricted, and it will make the livelihood-related activities suffer badly. The military is in power in Myanmar. Life in these camps is not going to be safe and peaceful.”

Htway Lwin, a Cox’s Bazar-based Rohingya community leader and human rights defender, said he had an extensive discussion with many refugees, and they all said that they do not want to return to Rakhine under current conditions.

‘Not yet safe’

“Their overwhelming sentiment is a desire to return to their homeland as soon as possible, but they feel that it is not yet safe to do so due to the lack of a secure environment in the Rakhine State. This reluctance stems from the fact that the Military Council still refers to Rohingya as Bengalis and intends to issue national verification cards [NVCs] that would effectively render them illegal immigrants in Myanmar,” Lwin told VOA.

After a controversial Citizenship Law stripped the Rohingya of their citizenship rights in 1982 and made them stateless, the authorities have been forcing the community members to accept NVCs. Rohingyas have widely rejected the NVC process, however, because it effectively identifies them as foreigners and restricts their movement and livelihood-related activities.

In the HRW statement, Shayna Bauchner, the organization’s Asia researcher, said authorities in Bangladesh “shouldn’t forget the reasons why Rohingya became refugees in the first place and recognize that none of those factors have changed.”

“Bangladesh is frustrated with its burden as host, but sending back refugees to the control of a ruthless Myanmar junta will just be setting the stage for the next devastating exodus,” she wrote.

Rohingya refugees want to go back to their homes in Rakhine one day, “but only when they can be safe and free in Rakhine,” Bauchner emphasized in an email to VOA.

“Those conditions don’t exist today, with Min Aung Hlaing, who orchestrated acts of genocide against them, sitting in Naypyidaw, buying arms from Russia and carrying out crimes against humanity and war crimes around the country,” she said.

The director of rights group Fortify Rights, John Quinley, said the Rohingya continue to face persecution by the junta in Rakhine.

“The junta is an illegal regime that is brutalizing its people, including the Rohingya. It continues to create conditions designed to be destructive against the minority Muslim community. What the junta is doing is genocide by attrition. Until the perpetrators are held accountable, atrocities will continue against the Rohingya,” Quinley told VOA.

“Rohingya are indigenous to Myanmar. They should be welcomed back, and all their rights restored unconditionally.”
…

Human rights groups and transgender activists are condemning a Pakistani religious court’s decision to strike down key parts of a transgender rights bill almost five years after parliament passed it.

Hailed as among the more progressive laws on transgender rights globally by the International Commission of Jurists, the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2018 gave transgender people in Pakistan the right to choose their gender identity as they perceived it themselves and to change it on previously issued government documents.

On Friday, the Federal Shariat Court declared those provisions to be in contradiction with Islam, the official religion of Pakistan.

The religious court stated that the “gender of a person must conform to the biological sex of a person,” not their feelings or self-perception.

“They have declared the basis of our existence, illegal,” said Nayyab Ali, a transgender community activist who was one of the respondents in the case.

Calling the verdict “a blow to the rights of the already beleaguered,” Amnesty International, in a statement, urged the Pakistani government to take immediate action to stop “the reversal of essential protections.”

The transgender community in Pakistan routinely faces discrimination. Often abandoned by families and relegated to mostly begging on the streets or dancing at parties to make money, trans women in particular face the threat of sexual assault, kidnapping and murder.

According to data collected by the International Commission of Jurists and its partner organizations, at least 20 transgender people were killed in Pakistan in 2021.

‘A threat to the family system’

Pakistan’s 2018 law defines transgender as anyone with a mixture of male and female genital features or ambiguous genitalia, a person assigned male at birth but who has undergone castration, or any person whose gender identity or expression differ from their assigned sex at birth.

The Federal Shariat Court declared that while Islam acknowledges the existence of people born with mixed or ambiguous genitalia and allows castration in “exceptional cases…as advised by expert medical professionals in order to cure [a] certain disease,” the religion does not allow castration to change gender or the act of choosing one’s own gender.

It said that many religious obligations depended on the biological sex of a person and could not be based on or changed depending on the innermost feelings of an individual.

Speaking to VOA, Senator Mushtaq Ahmad Khan, a member of the conservative political party Jamat-e-Islami, who has been leading the charge against the 2018 law, hailed the verdict.

“This law was … a threat to the family system, a threat to our values and traditions. It was a cultural invasion,” Khan said.

The court said it feared that the 2018 law could lead to crimes such as sexual molestation, assault and rape against women because it “makes it easy for a biological male to get access to the exclusive spaces and gatherings of females in the disguise of a “transgender woman.”

Some in the transgender community, such as rights activist Almas Bobby, also support the religious court’s decision.

One of the petitioners in the case against the transgender law, Bobby, like other critics, alleged that it allowed people to change gender “on a whim” and promoted homosexuality, which is illegal in Pakistan.

“Normal, healthy men who are capable of marrying [having heterosexual relations] and are married, too, should stay with their wife and kids,” said Bobby.

‘Erasure of an entire demographic’

Only a decade ago, in 2012, Pakistan’s top court ruled that transgender people have the same rights as all other citizens and ordered that a “third gender” category be added to national identity cards.

That ruling paved the way for the 2018 legislation, which expressly prohibited discrimination against transgender people in educational institutions, workplaces and health care, and it guaranteed them a share in inheritance.

Pakistan follows the Islamic system of inheritance, which divides assets among descendants based on their gender. Men get twice as much as women. The court struck down the act’s stipulation that a person identifying as a trans man would also get twice as much as a trans woman.

The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan expressed dismay over the ruling.

“This move seeks erasure of an entire demographic and its fundamental rights,” the commission said on Twitter. It said the ruling by the religious court undermines the will of parliament, and the commission is hopeful the top court will overturn it.

Senator Khan told VOA he hopes the government will not approach the Supreme Court and instead will approve a separate bill he introduced in parliament to protect the rights of those born with ambiguous genitalia.

Responding to VOA, the Human Rights Ministry said it accepted the ruling of the religious court. It said the senate’s Standing Committee on Human Rights was already considering amendments proposed by some legislators to the transgender law and will include the court’s verdict in the discussions.

Transgender rights activist Ali told VOA she plans to appeal to the Supreme Court’s special bench that reviews the decisions made by the Federal Shariat Court.

If the top court accepts the appeal, action on the religious court’s ruling would be paused until the Supreme Court’s special bench reaches a decision.
…

A British mountain guide returned to Nepal’s capital Friday after scaling Mount Everest for a 17th time, breaking his own record for the most ascents of the world’s highest mountain by a non-Sherpa guide.

Kenton Cool first climbed Mount Everest in 2004 and has been doing it almost every year since then.

“I really don’t think records belong on the mountains. Mountains are bigger than records,” Cool said at Kathmandu airport after getting off the helicopter that brought him back from Everest. “I am just happy we had a great climb and that we are back.”

Only Nepali Sherpa guides have scaled the peak more times than Cool. Veteran Sherpa guide Kami Rita climbed the mountain this week for a record 27th time. Another Sherpa guide, Pasang Dawa, has scaled it 26 times. Both Kami Rita and Pasang Dawa are still on the 8,849-meter mountain with their climbing groups and there is a chance they could reach the summit again before the spring climbing season finishes at the end of this month.

Hundreds of climbers and their local guides are currently on Everest and a rush for the summit is expected in the next few weeks. Nepalese authorities issued about 470 permits to climb Everest this season.

Nine people have died on Everest this year, including four Sherpa guides.

Cool was unable to climb Everest in 2014 because the season was canceled after 16 Sherpa guides were killed in an avalanche, and again in 2015 when an earthquake triggered an avalanche that killed 19 people. The 2020 climbing season was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. 
…

During a two-day summit this week in its Silk Road city of Xian, China promised more investment, enhanced security and development assistance to Central Asian states Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, which thanked Beijing for building infrastructure networks in the region, boosting trade and understanding their challenges.

“The world needs a stable, prosperous, harmonious and inter-connected Central Asia,” Chinese President Xi Jinping said. “China is ready to help Central Asian countries strengthen law enforcement, defense … and jointly promote peace and reconstruction in Afghanistan.”

Addressing a group of leaders increasingly dependent on Beijing, Xi urged them to resist “external attempts to interfere in domestic affairs … or instigate color revolutions” and admonished “zero tolerance” for terrorism, separatism and extremism.

Xi also pledged nearly $4 billion in financing and grants for Central Asia, whose regional trade with China reached $70 billion in 2022 — $31 billion of which transacted between China and oil-rich Kazakhstan alone.

Xi also pledged to accelerate the construction of Line D of the China-Central Asia natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan running through Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

The summit also announced progress toward a China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway project, which is still only on paper.

“We have already been moving to the practical stage with our Chinese and Kyrgyz partners,” said Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev.

Echoing other Central Asian presidents participating, Mirziyoyev underscored mutual trust, respect and interests.

“Today, Central Asia is different — it is united and strong, open to dialogue and full-scale partnership,” he said.

Like Washington, Beijing expresses steadfast support for these countries’ sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity. Without mentioning Russian aggression and its war in Ukraine and a direct reference to America’s role and ideals, Xi promoted his country as a more reliable and generous partner for Central Asia.

U.S. stance on authoritarian regimes

George Krol, a former U.S. ambassador to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, said the U.S. does not want to see the region “moving more into the arms” of China and its northern neighbor, Russia.

In his analysis, this is one of the reasons why Washington is not as critical of authoritarian rulers in Central Asia, despite the Biden administration’s assurances to advance democratic rule and counter such regimes.

“It’s in a way part of the pattern of engagement with Central Asia, which is not on its own merits so much as how it is perceived through the prism of other policies,” such as toward Beijing, Moscow and next-door Afghanistan.

Krol agrees with other analysts who say it reflects a “realpolitik” approach that acknowledges “one does not want to make an enemy out of these governments when you need them.”

With 36 years as a diplomat, mainly focusing on authoritarian former Soviet states, Krol said “the U.S. is incapable of changing these political cultures.”

“America has no secret formula, as we can see in our politics,” he said. “Change, disruptive politically and socially, should come from within, not outside.”

Krol said the Central Asian public is more concerned with stability. Presidents of the two key countries, Uzbekistan’s Mirziyoyev and Kazakhstan’s Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, have been pushing reform agendas endorsed by Washington.

“They ultimately want to be viewed as popular and legitimate in the eyes of the majority,” he said.

Mirziyoyev and Tokayev have raised expectations by admitting systemic issues and guaranteeing the rule of law. Tightly controlling the media, both are often criticized for overpromising and underdelivering.

Krol points to the “difficult neighborhood” in which they lack “the luxury of experimenting.”

“But the biggest enemy of Mirziyoyev and Tokayev can be their own bureaucracy and justice system failing to respond to their population.”

What will happen in the ensuing years is critical, Krol emphasized.

“Will they manage to continue to have the support of more people, or will their reform agenda be seen more and more as window dressing?” he said.

How do Central Asians view China?

Several people living and working in Central Asian nations spoke to VOA about their impressions of Chinese investment and whether they detect a contest for influence in the region.

Saida Sayip from Kyrgyzstan told VOA that commerce with China is crucial.

“I hope the railway linking us with Uzbekistan and China becomes a reality,” she said.

Turkish-trained Sayip said she sees little Chinese influence in education and health care, sectors mostly relying on foreign support.

Like many in the region, Sayip worries about water and energy security.

“Our resources must be preserved for our consumption. And we need a proper infrastructure to export them if we have extra,” she said.

For Muhabbat Mamirova from Uzbekistan, “China is not hot or a polarized topic like the U.S. and Russia.”

“We are aware of Beijing’s economic power, but there is not much fascination with this nation.” Mamirova, engaged in gender empowerment and social development projects, does not yet detect the cultural effect of China.

“When I talk with Chinese-educated people, I don’t sense the kind of an attachment the American-educated have towards the country of study. Young people focus more on American ideals. We aren’t curious about China as much as we are about the West,” she said.

“Perhaps we don’t care because the Chinese system is like ours?” Mamirova added. “We view the relationship with China as mostly political.”

Biologist Bakhtiyor Sheraliev, who earned his Ph.D. in China, described its posture in Central Asia as subtle.

“It does not seem aggressive or superior like Russia, but remember, we owe much of our external debt to Beijing,” he said. “I spent more than six years in China. I know how powerful it is. I would argue that most people here see some threat in China. Rather vague fear, but we feel it.”

Sheraliev said he thinks Central Asia states need a long-term strategy toward Beijing.

“China is a vast market, but as hard as it is, we must strive to be equal partners,” he said. “Our region doesn’t need yet another ‘big brother’ like Russia.”
…

Despite accusing Pakistan’s powerful army chief of being involved his political troubles, former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan now says he has no problem with the army chief but alleges that the head of the military has a problem with him.

Khan’s dramatic arrest May 9 from a court complex in the capital Islamabad led to three days of violent nationwide protests.

From his family home in Lahore, Khan spoke via Skype on Thursday with VOA Pakistan Bureau Chief Sarah Zaman at the VOA bureau in Islamabad after the Supreme Court declared his arrest unlawful.

The following transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.

VOA: What’s the situation at your residence in Lahore right now? And what do you fear can happen in the next 24 hours?

IMRAN KHAN, FORMER PAKISTAN PRIME MINISTER: What will happen in the next 24 hours? I have no idea.

VOA: Before your arrest, you had said many, many times said that if something happens to you, there will be violence, that your supporters will not spare anyone. Do you and your party leaders take any responsibility for the violence that happened?

KHAN: Absolutely not, and the reason is very simple. Whenever we say there will be protests, there have always been peaceful protests. Now remember, this is my 27th year in politics. Name me one time I’ve given a statement where I’ve said that we will indulge in violence. We have always said that we will stay within the constitution, within the law of the land. But protest is a democratic and constitutional right. When they tried to kill me, surely, then there should have been arson and burning and burning down buildings. It didn’t happen. The moment the army picked me up, there was always going to be a reaction. When they abducted me, proved by the Supreme Court that it was abduction, unlawful, there was always going to be a reaction.

VOA: You have used aggressive language many, many times. Don’t you think that when these kinds of statements come from a leader, that they create a sense of not just anger, but also a sense that if we’re angry, and we’re upset, we are entitled to go out and do whatever we want?

KHAN: This is not true. Well, then why didn’t they do it before? Why haven’t they done it for 27 years?

VOA: When I spoke to you mid-March, when authorities had come to serve a warrant to you, and your supporters came out and clashed with the police. When your party repeatedly sends out this call on social media, asking your supporters to come out, what does the party expect?

KHAN: Well, firstly, there is a history background to this. You must know why the supporters have come. First of all, the supporters, they know that the government was behind my assassination attempt. No investigation was done, so.

VOA: But you didn’t provide any proof, even to your supporters?

KHAN: How can I provide proof that there’s no investigation? This is my democratic, my constitutional right, that if I suspect someone, they should have been investigated, then they can prove their innocence. I wasn’t allowed my right to have a proper investigation.

So, you must remember the background behind it, there’s a huge amount of suspicion, there’s a lot of fear. So, I have time and again said, if you want to come and arrest me, just come up with a warrant and I will give myself up.

VOA: So, when they brought you a warrant in mid-March, why didn’t you give yourself up at that time?

KHAN: Because it was illegal. All you’re seeing right now, the crackdown on PTI, is to somehow make us so weak that we can’t compete in the elections.

VOA: OK, so lately you have openly criticized the army chief. But when your predecessors, when you were in government, and your opponents would criticize the military’s top leadership from meddling in politics, you said that they were committing treason. If their criticism of the army’s top leadership was treason, how is your criticism of that leadership any different?

KHAN: You know, so you have to put this in context. Just remember in what context I was talking about, the context was very simple. Nawaz Sharif and his daughter were blaming the army chief, that he was responsible for, for him getting convicted. This was the gist. All … everyone should know it was a two-year case in the Supreme Court and there was a joint investigation committee, which found him guilty. So, all I was saying is that, you know, just because he was convicted by the Supreme Court, he was blaming the judges, and the army chief. It was in that context, I was speaking. Right now, the reason why I named the army chief was because I was abducted inside the High Court precincts by the army. So, the army cannot act without permission from the number one, this is how the army works. So, that’s why I named him.

VOA: But you don’t see any difference between the fact that you called one person’s criticism treason, but your criticism is not treason. I mean, they had their reasons, you have your reason.

KHAN: You can’t compare the two. I mean, to have someone unlawfully abducted, confirmed by the Supreme Court … the Supreme Court called my abduction unlawful. So, how can you compare that? The same Supreme Court finds the other person was guilty after two years? Remember, it was a two-year investigation that took place. This is what we call moral equivalence by actually equating two different things, you actually make them equal. They’re not equal.

VOA: Your relationship with the military, and particularly the top leadership, how do you now expect to repair it?

KHAN: I have no problem. I never had a problem with the army chief. In fact, several times, you know, would hear that he was saying these things about me, which weren’t true, I would, I would try to reach out to him to clear [up] the issues. But the problem is from his side, it’s not from my side. I mean, why would I, who wants to take on the army of your own country? How can you do that? I mean, no political party. And even if you win, the country goes down. You don’t want to weaken your own army. So, let me repeat, the issue is not from my side, it’s from his side. And for, for the life of [me], I can’t work out what, what is in his mind that he’s decided that whatever happens Imran Khan should not come to power.

VOA: Former Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan, thank you very much for speaking with Voice of America.

KHAN: Thank you, thank you.
…

…

The U.N. children’s agency representative in Afghanistan says his agency, including its female Afghan staff, continue to work in the country despite a Taliban decree banning local women from working for the organization.

“I would say that all women of the U.N. in Afghanistan are working,” UNICEF’s Fran Equiza told reporters during a news conference at U.N. headquarters in New York. “They are working some from home, some of them from offices, some of them from the field.”

He said this applies to UNICEF and other U.N. agencies in Afghanistan.

“The Afghan women are not going to give up, no matter what,” he said, speaking of their resilience and commitment to their country. 

When the ban was announced in early April, the U.N. said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres found it “unacceptable” and “inconceivable” and feared it would further undermine the organization’s humanitarian work in the country. He convened a meeting of countries with special envoys for Afghanistan earlier this month in Doha, Qatar, to discuss what could be done about the intensifying Taliban crackdown on women.

Following the April edict, U.N. staff were instructed to work from home where possible until the organization could get clarity from Taliban authorities.

Equiza would not comment on whether female staff members have been physically or verbally harassed by the Taliban for defying their edict, stressing that the organization takes seriously its duty of care for its staff.

“We are still subject to threats and to a number of risks,” he told reporters. “We don’t take any decision that’s an unacceptable risk for anyone.”

The ban on Afghan women working with the U.N. followed a series of restrictions on women’s and girls’ rights, including prohibiting women from working with domestic and international aid groups and banning girls from attending secondary schools and universities.

The Taliban said last month that their decision to bar local women from working for the United Nations was an “internal social matter of Afghanistan” that all countries should respect. So far they have ignored an April 27 U.N. Security Council resolution demanding they swiftly reverse their restrictions.

Humanitarian emergency 

More than 28 million people, including more than 15 million children, need humanitarian and protection assistance in Afghanistan. In Afghanistan’s conservative society, female aid workers are critical to reaching a large portion of the population.

Children are particularly hard hit by rampant poverty, which is estimated to affect nearly 90% of the population.

“They wake up hungry. They go to bed hungry. They don’t have clean water to quench their thirst, or soft blankets in which to sleep,” Equiza said. “They have become all too used to laboring at home, on the streets, in fields, in mines and in shops. Too many live in fear of violence or early marriage. Too many are burdened by the weight of adult responsibility. Too many have been robbed of an education — their one hope of a better life.”

UNICEF says 2.3 million Afghan children are expected to face acute malnutrition in 2023. Of that number, 875,000 of them need treatment for severe acute malnutrition, which can be deadly.

UNICEF has appealed for $1.65 billion this year to reach 19 million Afghans, including 10.3 million children. The appeal is less than a quarter funded, with the year nearly half over.
…

India’s Central Bureau of Investigation arrested a freelance reporter on espionage charges this week, saying the journalist illegally collected sensitive information about the Indian army and shared the information with foreign governments.

On Tuesday night, longtime reporter Vivek Raghuvanshi was arrested for allegedly collecting sensitive information about the Indian army and the Defense Research Development Organization, which leads the military’s research and development, according to The Indian Express.

Raghuvanshi’s associate, a former Navy commander, was also arrested on similar charges.

For over three decades, Raghuvanshi reported on India’s defense industry for media, including the U.S.-based Sightline Media Group, which publishes Defense News and Military Times. Raghuvanshi is the India correspondent for Defense News.

The Washington-based National Press Club condemned Raghuvanshi’s arrest and called for his release.

“We were disappointed to hear of the arrest of journalist Vivek Raghuvanshi in India this week,” Eileen O’Reilly, president of the National Press Club, and Gil Klein, president of the National Press Club Journalism Institute, said in a statement Wednesday.

“The charges against him of working with a foreign intelligence service are completely at odds with his well-established professional profile. Vivek has a solid reputation and the respect of his colleagues. We hope his release and these allegations are resolved swiftly and Vivek is allowed to resume his reporting,” O’Reilly and Klein continued in the statement.

A spokesperson from the Central Bureau of Investigation, or CBI, told The Indian Express that Raghuvanshi and his associate, Ashish Pathak, “were in possession of classified secret documents related to Indian defense establishments.”

“Raghuvanshi was allegedly collecting confidential information related to India’s defense procurement from various sources and was in contact with several foreign entities/agents/persons,” the CBI spokesperson said.

At least 10 journalists are currently detained in India, according to the press freedom group Reporters Without Borders, which ranks India 161 out of 180 countries in terms of press freedom.
…

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi heads to Papua New Guinea later this week for a visit aimed at shoring up India’s outreach to Pacific Island countries, with an eye on countering China’s growing footprint in the Pacific.

The first visit by an Indian prime minister to the largest of the Pacific Island nations comes as New Delhi’s hostilities with Beijing have prompted it to work more closely with countries such as the United States, Japan and Australia in the Indo-Pacific region.    

Modi will stop in Papua New Guinea capital Port Moresby on the second leg of a three-nation tour during which he will first attend the Group of Seven summit in Japan and then go on to Australia.

On May 22, Modi and Papua New Guinean Prime Minister James Marape will host the third summit of the Forum for India-Pacific Islands Cooperation, a grouping of India and 14 Pacific Island countries.

The summit, which is being held eight years after India hosted the last one in 2015, could give fresh momentum to New Delhi’s bid to establish a presence in the Pacific Island countries. India began its outreach in 2014, but it has been slow to get off the ground.   

“Those places are very strategic if you want to make a naval base or a friendly port or friendly airstrip and they also have vast ocean resources,” retired navy chief Arun Prakash told VOA Tuesday.

“The main worry for Western countries and India is that several of these countries are a void and China tends to walk into voids and fill them up.”

The 14 countries set to participate in the Port Moresby summit range from such large islands as Fiji, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands to smaller ones such as Tonga and Tuvalu. The other countries will be Kiribati, Samoa, Vanuatu, Niue, Micronesia, Marshall Islands, Cook Islands, Palau and Nauru.

Papua New Guinea is especially significant. The island of 9.5 million is the largest of the Pacific Island countries and one of the few with which India has longstanding ties and a trade relationship. It is also home to a small Indian population of about 3,000.    

Modi and Marape will meet Monday and the two sides are expected to sign pacts that include cooperation in micro- and small to medium enterprises to agreements between their state broadcasters and reciprocal arrangements for issuing visas on arrival.

“One of the important challenges that Papua New Guinea faces is climate change and adaptation. These are areas where India can play an important role by offering affordable partnerships in areas like solar energy,” Swati Prabhu, an associate fellow at the Center for New Economic Diplomacy in New Delhi told VOA.

Papua New Guinea also wants to shift its economy from export of primary materials such as natural gas and minerals to finished products.

The country is being courted by the U.S. and its allies amid concerns about China’s growing military and economic influence in the region. Chinese President Xi Jinping visited in 2018.

U.S. President Joe Biden was to visit Papua New Guinea on May 22 but has canceled the visit to focus on debt limit talks in Washington.

China has begun making inroads in the Pacific Island countries with its Belt and Road initiative – last year Beijing signed a security deal with the Solomon Islands and in March it won a contract to redevelop the port in its capital city, Honiara.

Analysts say India hopes to partner with the Pacific Island countries with development initiatives in areas such as clean energy, technology and community development projects such as solar electrification and supply of agricultural equipment.

Affordable clean energy initiatives are especially important in a region whose leaders say climate change is their greatest security threat amid worsening cyclones and rising sea levels.

Some see India’s outreach to the Pacific Island countries as part of its ambitions to be viewed as an emerging global power.

Analysts however say that while India’s bid to build influence in the Pacific Island countries marks an ambitious beginning, it has its limitations as it cannot match China’s resources and New Delhi’s primary focus will have to remain on its immediate neighborhood in South Asia and the Indian Ocean.

“If you call yourself an Indo-Pacific power and are part of the Quad grouping, you must make some outreach to the Pacific also. But whether it is within our capabilities to sustain ourselves that far out in the Pacific is a question mark. We don’t have such deep pockets and our navy is also relatively small,” Prakash said. “But perhaps in coordination with Japan, Australia and United States, we can render assistance there,” he said.
…

China is scheduled this week to host its first in-person summit with Central Asian leaders starting one day before the Group of Seven nations convenes for its annual summit in Japan.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to promote economic engagement and increased security ties with Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan during talks Thursday and Friday in China’s western city Xian.

Beijing’s first summit with those nations last year, held virtually, came as China continued to build out its Belt and Road Initiative, a massive investment in infrastructure aimed at boosting international trade and energy links.

Regional countries are interested in greater access to Chinese markets, and Beijing is seeking to boost its security and political ties.

US interests in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan

In Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, which have been America’s strategic partners for two decades, Washington also has strong interests in building ties.

Earlier this year U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled to the capitals of both nations to promote investment and urge political reforms.

Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, 65, and Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, 69, have pledged to transform their countries through substantial reforms, which Washington has encouraged.

In Astana on Feb. 28, Blinken said, “We look forward to seeing the additional concrete steps Kazakhstan will take to realize that agenda — expanding public participation in the political process, increasing government accountability, curbing corruption … and protecting human rights.”

He noted that American businesses have injected more than $50 billion into the Kazakh economy since 1991 when, like Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan became independent with the breakup of the Soviet Union.

On March 1 in Tashkent, Blinken said the U.S. wants to see full implementation of Mirziyoyev’s programs, stressing fundamental rights and assistance. He reiterated that America was making investments in the region that empower people “to shape their own future.”

Veteran U.S. diplomat George Krol, who served as ambassador to both countries, argues that the U.S. should not demand what he calls “textbook democracy” from these or other nations, given the difficulties some parts of the region have gone through.

“I don’t think they want to give political power to turn it over for unknown consequences,” Krol told VOA in an interview.

With neighbors such as China and Russia and the perception that democratic systems are not secure, “they look at Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan or Pakistan … [and] they don’t want to follow.”

Krol, who is with Harvard University’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and an adjunct professor at the U.S. Naval War College, says Uzbek and Kazakh leaders have demonstrated they want to grant as much freedom as feasible without losing control.

“It wouldn’t pass the test of democracy in the eyes of political scientists or organizations in Europe and the United States. But in the context of Central Asia, it is different,” he said.

Neither regime tolerates opposition or political pluralism. All registered parties support the presidents without questioning their policies. Striving for some diversity of opinion may be a significant success, Krol suggests, asserting that the establishments in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan still question the idea of opposition.

They fear that nationalist and extremist groups may rise along with those promoting hostilities toward Russia and China among others.

Following constitutional reforms last year, Tokayev was reelected for a new term of seven years. Mirziyoyev is following the same path, gearing up for snap elections on July 9, as allowed by the country’s constitution approved in an April 30 referendum.

Krol is not surprised these leaders, byproducts of the Soviet mentality, cling to power. As a diplomat in Belarus in 1994, he observed the election of Alexander Lukashenko, who is still running the country.

“It’s very hard to see that changing because these systems don’t produce leaders where they come out of a political milieu,” Krol said. “They are not selected by [free and fair] election.”

Central Asia suffers from concentrated nepotism. During Nursultan Nazarbayev’s three-decade rule in Kazakhstan, his offspring controlled the oil-rich country. In Uzbekistan, former strongman Islam Karimov’s eldest daughter Gulnara Karimova has been in prison on charges of organized crime and extortion since 2014.

Krol, who watched Nazarbayev’s and Karimov’s scandals up close, points out that Mirziyoyev’s eldest daughter Saida Mirziyoyeva is emerging as a key political figure, working in her father’s administration and representing him internationally. Senior U.S. diplomats have met Mirziyoyeva in Washington and Tashkent, acknowledging her relevance and influence. While Tokayev’s family is out of sight for now, the Uzbek leader’s family members, including his sons-in-law, surround him in various roles.

Krol doubts the U.S. is “truly optimistic that things would change” in these countries but sees the Biden administration “doing lip service … making all the sounds you would expect.”

Meanwhile, the Uzbek president says fighting corruption is a priority, renewing promises regarding the rule of law and judicial independence.

At the annual meeting of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in that Uzbekistan hosted in Samarkand on May 17, Mirziyoyev claimed that “the fundamental reforms that we began six years ago have completely changed the image of our country.”

Listing the successes of this government, such as eradicating forced labor and child labor, and integrating with neighbors to enhance stability and regional connectivity, he declared that international support has been key in implementing reforms and achieving results.
…

Mountaineer Naila Kayani on Sunday scaled the world’s tallest peak, Mount Everest, becoming the second female Pakistani climber to achieve the feat.

Kayani also became the first Pakistani female to climb five peaks above 8,000 meters, according to the Alpine Club of Pakistan. 

Samina Baig, a high-altitude female mountaineer from Gilgit-Baltistan, made history in 2013 when she became the first Pakistani woman to ascend Mount Everest.

Originally from Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Kayani lives in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, with her family. An avid mountaineer, her wedding photo in 2017 was taken at the base of K2, the second-highest mountain in the world. Those photos later went viral on social media.

Kayani surprised everyone in 2021 by climbing the 8,035-meter Gasherbrum II peak just a few months after giving birth.

Speaking to VOA, Karar Haidari, secretary of the Alpine Club of Pakistan, said Kayani is a very brave woman who hopes to summit each of the 14 tallest peaks in the world above 8,000 meters as soon as is feasible.

Haidari said Kayani also conquered the 8,068-meter-high Gasherbrum I peak in July 2022 and the 8,091-meter-high Annapurna peak soon afterward.

Haidari said renowned Pakistani mountaineer Sajid Sadpara and British-Pakistani female climber Nadia Azad also scaled Mount Everest on Monday. Sadpara climbed Mount Everest without the need of oxygen. 

Kayani told VOA in 2021 that she had always wanted to be a mountaineer but was unable to do so because she did not live in a mountainous environment. She said it is easier for people living in mountainous regions to climb mountains compared with those who are raised in cities.

Kayani said she faced multiple challenges while summiting K2, because the mountain is very steep and there are no places to rest or drink water.

When asked about a terrifying moment she had while climbing, Kayani recalled a moment in 2022 when she was standing on the blue ice at the K2 bottleneck with other climbers. A terrifying feeling washed over her: What would happen if she did not return to her daughters alive?

Kayani said as soon as she faced the peak in front of her, all of her anxieties vanished, and she decided to not allow fear to control her ascent.

This story originated in VOA’s Urdu Service. 
…

Afghanistan’s Taliban confirmed Wednesday they had appointed a caretaker prime minister to oversee daily affairs, saying the incumbent, Mohammad Hasan Akhund, is unwell and needed time to recover.

The new head of the all-male Taliban cabinet, Abdul Kabir, is under terrorism-related United Nations sanctions, along with several other senior members of his hardline government. He was elevated from serving as the deputy prime minister for political affairs.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid announced the power shift on Twitter. He said that Akhund, 78, had been in the southern city of Kandahar for some time undergoing treatment and resting, and he will return to Kabul soon to resume his duties.

“It’s a routine matter in the governance process for a caretaker to take charge to ensure the smooth running of the administrative affairs,” wrote Mujahid. “No one needs to worry about it, nor should they use it for propaganda.”

Mujahid was responding to reported claims that Akhund had resigned due to alleged internal Taliban rifts and would not return to the office.

The Taliban reclaimed power in August 2021, when the United States and NATO troops departed Afghanistan after two decades of involvement in the war. The Taliban subsequently established an interim government and appointed Akhund as its prime minister.

The hardline group has banned teenage girls from receiving education beyond the sixth grade and women working for the United Nations and non-governmental organizations in Afghanistan. Most female government employees have not been allowed to return to work since the Taliban took control of Kabul.

The Taliban reject international calls for reversing the restrictions on women, saying it is an “internal social matter” of Afghanistan.

Torek Farhadi, a former Afghan official, said that instead of indulging in political reshuffling, the Taliban needed to pay attention to easing restrictions on women to address domestic and foreign concerns.

“The international community is looking more to change policies from Taliban than musical chairs among them in top positions of power,” Farhadi told VOA. “What is expected is to let teenage girls go back to school and let women work in government offices and NGOs,” the analyst said.

Kabir was placed on the U.N. sanctions list in early 2001, when he served as the acting prime minister in the then-Taliban government shortly before it collapsed in the wake of the U.S.-led military invasion of Afghanistan.

The newly appointed Taliban prime minister was appointed as the military commander for eastern Afghanistan in 2007, when the then-insurgent group was waging attacks against U.S.-led foreign forces and their local Afghan allies.

Kabir was blamed for plotting some of the deadliest bombings and other insurgent attacks. He was allegedly collecting money from drug traffickers on behalf of the Taliban, the U.N. list showed. He was a member of the Qatar-based Taliban political office during negotiations with the United States, culminating in a deal in February 2020 and paving the ground for Washington to pull out of its longest war in history.

Reclusive Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada and current Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani are among other top leaders under U.N. and U.S. terrorism-related sanctions.

The Taliban takeover led to an abrupt loss of most international aid for Afghanistan, which remains one of the worst humanitarian emergencies in the world. The U.N. says two-thirds of the country’s estimated 40 million population is food insecure

Aid workers say the Taliban’s restrictions on women have worsened the humanitarian situation.
…

India has stepped up security in the Jammu and Kashmir region because of an increase in militant attacks in the run-up to a G-20 meeting on tourism in the Himalayan territory, officials said on Wednesday.

The city of Srinagar, the summer capital of the federal territory, is due to host a tourism working group meeting of G-20 members on May 22-24, part of a series of meetings ahead of a G-20 summit in New Delhi in September.

Islamist militants have stepped up attacks this year in the Jammu region, across the mountains from the Kashmir Valley where Srinagar is located.

Ten soldiers and seven civilians have been killed in four attacks in Jammu this year.

Security officials said they fear the separatist militants could try to promote their cause with an attack before or during the G-20 meeting.

“The timing of these attacks is worrisome as they are planned just before the G-20 meeting,” said a senior Indian army officer in the region. He declined to be identified as he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Military and police officers said they had intelligence information that militants might target a military-run school in Jammu and take students hostage.

In response, such schools had been shut and classes moved online until after the G-20 meeting, they said.

Security agencies are not taking any chances in Srinagar, officers said.

Vijay Kumar, chief of police in the Kashmir Valley, told Reuters that commandos had been deployed in the city and members of a counter-terrorism force would be on stationed in various places.

Srinagar has been at the center of the insurgency by Muslim militants against Indian rule since 1989.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed although the violence has been reduced in recent years.

India blames Pakistan for supporting the Muslim insurgents. Pakistan denies that and accuses India of violating the rights of Kashmir’s Muslim people. India denies that.

The nuclear-armed neighbors, who have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir, both claim the region in full but rule it in part.

 
…

A Nepali sherpa scaled Mount Everest for a record 27th time on Wednesday, beating his own record, a government official and his hiking company said.  

Kami Rita Sherpa, 53, scaled the 8,849 meter (29,032-foot) mountain early in the morning along the traditional southeast ridge route, guiding a foreign climber.

“Yes, Kami Rita climbed Sagarmatha for the 27th time,” said Department of Tourism official Bigyan Koirala, referring to the mountain by its Nepali name.

Separately, Ishwari Paudel of the Himalayan Guides company said British climber Kenton Cool, 49, made his 17th ascent of the mountain on Wednesday, the most by any foreign climber. “Cool is now descending after guiding his own private client,” Paudel said.

Thaneswar Guragai, general manager of the Seven Summit Treks, for which Kami Rita works, said he got to the summit at 8.30 a.m. (0245 GMT) along with the foreign climber.  

“We’re trying to get details. For now it’s 100% confirmed that Kami Rita scaled for the 27th time,” Guragai said.

Kami Rita, who refers to himself by his first names, scaled Everest for the first time in 1994 and has climbed it almost every year since then, except in 2014, 2015 and 2020, when climbing was halted for various reasons.

Garrett Madison of the U.S.-based Madison Mountaineering company, who has climbed Everest 12 times, five of them with Kami Rita, described him as a “very strong climber.”

“Very inspirational to see a local climber continue pushing the limits on Mount Everest,” Madison told Reuters by telephone from Everest’s base camp, where he is preparing for a 13th ascent.

Kami Rita’s company said in a statement he had “dedicated his life to mountaineering and has become synonymous with the world’s highest peak.”

Sherpas are known for their climbing skills and many make a living guiding foreign clients up Everest and other mountains.

May is the ideal time for trying to reach the top of Everest, with clear weather before the monsoon arrives from the south, bringing cloud and snow to the peaks and rain to the lowlands.

This year, Nepal has issued 478 permits, the most ever, for people to climb Everest compared with the previous record of 408 in 2021.

The Himalayan nation, which is heavily reliant on climbing, trekking and tourism for foreign exchange, has been criticized for allowing too many climbers, many of them inexperienced, to try for Everest’s summit.

Dangerous overcrowding can develop, especially at a bottleneck called the Hillary Step, just below the summit. In 2019, nine exhausted climbers died on Everest after queues built up of climbers going up and down.

Everest has been climbed more than 11,000 times, from both the Nepali and Tibetan sides, since it was first scaled in 1953, with many people going up multiple times.

More than 320 people have died on the mountain, hiking officials said.
…

India’s top female and male wrestlers are braving rain and canings by police as they continue protests in Delhi demanding “convincing legal action” against a former top Indian wrestling official who is accused of sexually harassing several female Indian wrestlers. 

The wrestlers, including some Olympic and other international tournament medalists, began their second stretch of sit-in protests April 23 in Jantar Mantar, Delhi’s popular protest site. They are demanding the arrest of Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, a former president of the Wrestling Federation of India, after saying they were not satisfied with the “insufficient action” taken against the accused.  

Singh, a member of parliament of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and a party strongman, has not been arrested in the case. He insists that the allegations against him are “baseless,” calling them “a conspiracy” to throw him out of parliament. 

On Monday as the wrestlers, including Olympic medalist Sakshi Malik, marched to Connaught Place, the financial hub of the Indian capital, Malik said the authorities were indifferent to the wrestlers’ fight for justice.   

“We feel our protest is being confined in Jantar Mantar. So, we have taken a march to Connaught Place to meet ordinary people and send the message of our protest to them. We need the whole country on our side, because this is a fight for the women of our country,” Malik said to local media.  

“We will make our agitation to an international level.,” said Vinesh Phogat, another wrestler in the sit-in protest and the first Indian woman to win gold at both the Commonwealth and Asian Games. 

“We will approach Olympians and Olympic medalists around the world and explain our situation. We will seek their support in our fight for justice,” Phogat said.  

Phogat said the wrestlers have set May 21 as the “deadline” for action against the accused.  

“If the authorities fail to act against him by then, we will take a big call on our agitation next week,” she said, without explaining the “big call.”    

Singh and several wrestling coaches are accused of sexually harassing seven Indian female wrestlers, including one minor. The allegations first became public last year.  

In January, some wrestlers organized a sit-in protest in Delhi demanding action against Singh and the coaches. However, the wrestlers called off the protest within three days following assurance of action from Indian Sports Minister Anurag Thakur.    

Saying they were unhappy with the lack of action taken against Singh, the wrestlers began their second stretch of protests on April 23.     

After the seven wrestlers petitioned the Supreme Court to take action against Singh, the court issued an order on April 25 to police in Delhi to investigate the case and file charges as soon as possible.     

On May 12, a public prosecutor told the court that “considering the seriousness of the case,” a Special Investigation Team, or SIT, had been formed to look into the case.     

The wrestlers decided that was not enough and continued to protest.    

“Waiting for justice, we are protesting under the open sky, by the roadside, and the accused is staying comfortably at his home,” Phogat sobbed in front of media cameras.         

In a significant move, the Indian Olympic Association last Friday took charge of all WFI activities and practically dissolved the top wrestling body, an action that has been welcomed by the wrestlers.    

“This is the first step in our fight for justice — a small victory for us. We will continue our protest until we get justice,” Bajrang Punia, a bronze medalist in men’s freestyle wrestling at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, said.    

On Monday, the wrestlers sent an open letter to two female ministers of the BJP-led federal government and 41 other female MPs of the party, seeking support in their “fight for justice.”     

“Being women Members of Parliament of the ruling party, we have a lot of hope from you and request you to help us,” the letter said. “Please become our voice and save our dignity.” 
…

Human rights defenders have sharply criticized Pakistan for announcing plans to use military laws to prosecute those responsible for arson during recent protests sparked by the arrest of former Prime Minister Imran Khan.

In a statement on Tuesday, Amnesty International described the controversial move as alarming and contrary to international law, and demanded it be struck down immediately.

“This is purely an intimidation tactic designed to crack down on dissent by exercising fear of an institution that has never been held to account for its overreach,” said Dinushika Dissanayake, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for South Asia, referring to the all-powerful Pakistani military.

Khan was violently taken into custody by paramilitary forces on graft charges from outside a courtroom in the capital, Islamabad, last week as he prepared to attend a hearing in a separate case.

The popular 70-year-old politician has since been released after the Supreme Court outlawed his arrest. But his detention provoked supporters of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Party, or PTI, leading to several days of nationwide protests, some of which turned violent.

Protesters clashed with riot police, leaving several people dead and hundreds more injured.

Rallies also marched toward military installations in major cities. They chanted slogans against the powerful Pakistani institution long considered a sacred cow. In the eastern city of Lahore, a group of people stormed the residence of a regional army commander and vandalized it.

The violence prompted the military to announce on Monday it had collected “irrefutable evidence” about culprits involved in “these heinous crimes” and vowed to prosecute them under military and anti-espionage laws. The laws provide for the administration of military justice, including the trial and punishment of army personnel.

“Amnesty International has documented a catalog of human rights violations stemming from trying civilians in military courts in Pakistan, including flagrant disregard for due process, lack of transparency, coerced confessions, and executions after grossly unfair trials,” the global watchdog said.

The country’s independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) said Tuesday it strongly opposes using the law to try civilians.

“While those responsible for arson and damaging public and private property during the recent protests should be held to account, they remain entitled to due process,” the HRCP said.

Incumbent Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has vowed to open more anti-terrorism courts to try PTI protesters for their role in last week’s violence.

Khan has distanced his party from the attacks on the military and other targets during the unrest.

The cricket star-turned-politician accused military intelligence agencies of being behind the incidents of shooting and arson during “peaceful” protests by his supporters to justify a nationwide military-backed security crackdown on his party, Pakistan’s largest. Khan did not immediately offer any evidence to back his claims.

He demanded an independent investigation, saying, “Identification of elements involved in this unusual incident of violence and chaos through a credible investigation is inevitable.”

More than 7,000 PTI members, including most of its central leadership, have been arrested on charges of instigating the violence since the unrest erupted a week ago.

The HRCP criticized the police action against Khan’s party, saying it “was deeply concerned about reports of random arrests and cases filed arbitrarily against PTI workers across Pakistan.”

The rights defender stressed the need for making a distinction “between those resorting to violence and nonviolent political workers.”

Khan’s nearly four-year-old government was toppled in April 2022 by a parliamentary vote of no confidence. He has since persistently accused the military of orchestrating his removal to enable Sharif to become prime minister. Both the army and Sharif reject the charges.

The deposed prime minister faces more than 100 legal challenges, ranging from corruption and sedition to terrorism and murder charges. He rejects the allegations, saying they are a pretext for the military to block him from returning to power in elections scheduled for fall.

Khan’s critics say he won the 2018 elections to become the prime minister with the military’s backing, and his ouster was the outcome of tensions with the institution over foreign policy and other issues.

The PTI chief was shot and wounded in the legs late last November while leading a protest march to push the Sharif government to announce early elections.

Khan has accused, among others, a senior general of the military-led Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan’s primary spy agency, of plotting to kill him. Sharif’s government and the army have denied the charges as baseless. Khan’s scathing criticism of the military over the past year has been unprecedented in the 75-year history of the country.

The military has ruled Pakistan for more than three decades through staged coups against elected governments, and it continues to influence policymaking and foreign policy matters even when it is not in power. Critics say this influence is responsible for the fragility of democracy in the nuclear-armed South Asian nation of about 230 million people.

The Wilson Center in Washington, commenting on the crisis in Pakistan, said Tuesday that the events of the past week provide clear indications that the noose is tightening around Khan and his political party.

“It is a familiar narrative in Pakistan for an opposition party that has fallen out of favour with the military to face adverse consequences,” the center wrote. “However, more significantly, the Army, which has historically held a tight grip on power in the country, has emerged as the most damaged institution from this episode.”
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While United Nations and international aid agencies are racing to provide lifesaving aid to survivors of Cyclone Mocha in Bangladesh and Myanmar, humanitarians are expressing frustration at bureaucratic and political restrictions imposed by Myanmar’s military rulers.

Cyclone Mocha, the most powerful storm to hit the Bay of Bengal in the past 10 years, made three landfalls with brutal force on Sunday, uprooting trees, ripping off roofs and breaking down power lines as winds of 250 kph swept through the region.

The first area to be hit was Rakhine State, where some 600,000 Rohingya Muslims live, nearly 150,000 of them in camps for internally displaced people. Landfalls followed in Chin State and Northern Sagaing region.

“The access is challenged mostly in Northern Rakhine where the typhoon hit severely,” said Rajeeve K.C., disaster risk management delegate for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).

Speaking from Myanmar’s capital, Yangon, he said “Chin and Northern Sagaing region are also heavy restricted areas in terms of access.”

Unrest, violence

Civil unrest and armed violence have increased in both places since the military junta mounted a coup against the democratically elected government on February 1, 2021.

Myanmar did not comment on the issue of restrictions, but state media said Tuesday that junta chief Min Aung Hlaing had visited Rakhine’s capital Sittwe to assess the damage.

Rajeev K.C. said 849 volunteers from the International Committee of the Red Cross have been at the forefront of efforts to curb the disaster in Myanmar. At the same time, he said, IFRC volunteers are “on standby to provide strategic, operational, financial, technical and other support.”

However, he noted the “IFRC was not able to collect primary data from the field because of the existing limitations,” noting that “access remained one of the key challenges” in providing lifesaving relief to the people in Myanmar.

5.4 million in storm’s path

Ramanathan Balakrishnan, the U.N. resident and humanitarian coordinator in Myanmar, said 5.4 million people were expected to have been in the path of the cyclone, with some 3.9 million considered to be the most vulnerable.

“It is really a nightmare scenario for the cyclone to hit areas with such deep pre-existing needs,” said Balakrishnan. “These are some of the poorest parts of the country. The people are still reeling from accumulative crises of COVID, conflict, political and economic upheaval. Now they are also in the frontline of the climate crisis.”

Balakrishnan said that coping capacities were stretched to the limit and the needs for humanitarian support will be extremely high.

“To deliver, we will need access to the people, relaxation of travel authorization by the authorities, require an expedited custom clearance for commodities. Of course, we will also need a huge infusion of funds to respond to this massive need.”

Balakrishnan noted that the U.N.’s $763 million humanitarian response plan was only 10% funded.

“It is worth remembering that 17.6 million people were already in humanitarian need in Myanmar even before this disaster,” Balakrishnan said. “To put that in perspective, that is the same number of people in humanitarian need as it is in Ukraine.”

Basics needed

Speaking from Yangon, Balakrishnan cited health, shelter, water, sanitation and hygiene support as early priorities.

The World Health Organization (WHO), which is delivering health care to people in Myanmar and Bangladesh, said the major impact of the cyclone has been in Myanmar.

Edwin Salvador, WHO South-East Asia regional emergency director, said unofficial reports indicate 14 health facilities across the country have been damaged.

He said “WHO staff will reach affected areas as soon as possible to identify the impact and what further support is needed.

“Currently, we have event-based surveillance planned for difficult-to-access areas, to gather information from as many sources as possible … and take timely action.”

He warned that in flooded areas where safe drinking water and sanitation is lacking, people are at “risk of waterborne diseases, such as diarrhea, hepatitis, and those caused by mosquitoes such as dengue and malaria.”

To move things along in the right direction, Balakrishnan said the U.N. has opened communication channels with all authorities in Myanmar and has asked for unrestricted access to affected communities.

“The one thing we do not want is politicization of the humanitarian aid,” he said. “That is very important.”
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The death toll in cyclone-hit Myanmar’s Rakhine state rose to 41 on Tuesday, local leaders told AFP, as villagers tried to piece together ruined homes and waited for aid and support.

With winds of up to 195 kilometers per hour, Mocha made landfall on Sunday, downing power pylons and smashing wooden fishing boats to splinters.

At least 41 people died in the villages of Bu Ma and nearby Khaung Doke Kar, inhabited by the persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority, local leaders told AFP reporters at the scene. 

“There will be more deaths, as more than a hundred people are missing,” said Karlo, the head of Bu Ma village near state capital Sittwe.

Nearby, Aa Bul Hu Son, 66, said prayers at the grave of his daughter, whose body was recovered on Tuesday morning. 

“I wasn’t in good health before the cyclone, so we were delayed in moving to another place,” he told AFP.

“While we were thinking about moving, the waves came immediately and took us.”

“I just found her body in the lake in the village and buried her right away. I can’t find any words to express my loss.”

Other residents walked the seashore searching for family members swept away by a storm surge that accompanied the cyclone, AFP correspondents said.

Mocha was the most powerful cyclone to hit the area in over a decade, churning up villages, uprooting trees and knocking out communications across much of Rakhine state.

Myanmar’s junta said on Monday that five people were killed, without specifying where.

It was not clear if that toll included any of those killed in Bu Ma and Khaung Doke Kar.

AFP has contacted a junta spokesman for comment on the new death toll.

‘No one has come to ask’  

Widely viewed as interlopers in Myanmar, the Rohingya are denied citizenship and healthcare, and require permission to travel outside of their villages in western Rakhine state.

Many others live in camps after being displaced by decades of ethnic conflict.

The United Nations refugee office said it was investigating reports that Rohingya living in displacement camps had been killed in the storm.

It was “working to start rapid needs assessments in hard-hit areas” of Rakhine state, it added.

In neighboring Bangladesh, officials told AFP that no one had died in the cyclone, which passed close to sprawling refugee camps that house almost one million Rohingya who fled a Myanmar military crackdown in 2017. 

“Although the impact of the cyclone could have been much worse, the refugee camps have been severely affected, leaving thousands desperately needing help,” the UN said as it made an urgent appeal for aid late Monday.

Cyclones — the equivalent of hurricanes in the North Atlantic or typhoons in the Northwest Pacific — are a regular and deadly menace on the coast of the northern Indian Ocean where tens of millions of people live.

Non-profit ClimateAnalytics said rising temperatures may have contributed to Cyclone Mocha’s intensity.

“We can see sea surface temperatures in the Bay of Bengal in the last month have been significantly higher than they were even 20 years ago,” said the group’s Peter Pfleiderer.

“Warmer oceans allow storms to gather power, quickly, and this has devastating consequences for people.”

On Tuesday, contact was slowly being restored with Sittwe, which is home to around 150,000 people, AFP reporters said, with roads being cleared and internet connections re-established.

Photos released by state media showed Rakhine-bound aid being loaded onto a ship in commercial hub Yangon.

Rohingya villagers told AFP that they were yet to receive any assistance.

“No government, no organization has come to our village,” said Kyaw Swar Win, 38, from Bu Ma village.

“We haven’t eaten for two days… We haven’t got anything and all I can say is that no one has even come to ask.”
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