DruamAmericas

FBI arrests Afghan man officials say plotted Election Day attack in US

washington — The FBI has arrested an Afghan man who officials say was inspired by the Islamic State militant organization and was plotting an Election Day attack targeting large crowds in the United States, the Justice Department said Tuesday.

Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, 27, of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, told investigators after his arrest Monday that he had planned his attack to coincide with Election Day next month and that he and a juvenile co-conspirator expected to die as martyrs, according to charging documents. 

Tawhedi, who entered the U.S. in 2021 on a special immigrant visa, had taken steps in recent weeks to advance his attack plans, including by ordering AK-47 rifles, liquidating his family’s assets, and buying one-way tickets for his wife and child to travel home to Afghanistan. 

“Terrorism is still the FBI’s number one priority, and we will use every resource to protect the American people,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a statement. 

After he was arrested, the Justice Department said, Tawhedi told investigators he had planned an attack for Election Day that would target large gatherings of people. 

Tawhedi was charged with conspiring and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group, which is designated by the U.S. as a foreign terrorist organization. 

It was not immediately clear if he had a lawyer who could speak on his behalf. 
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DruamAmericas

Biden cancels Germany, Angola trip to oversee Hurricane Milton response

President Joe Biden postponed his trip to Germany and Angola Tuesday to oversee the response to Hurricane Milton, which is heading toward Florida just days after Hurricane Helene ravaged the southeastern United States. Patsy Widakuswara reports. Jose Pernalete contributed to this report.
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DruasiaAsia

Religious education surges under Taliban as secular schooling languishes

Washington — The number of madrassas, or religious schools, has increased fourfold under the Taliban in Afghanistan as experts worry that the rise could fuel extremism in the country and limit opportunities for younger Afghans, particularly girls.  

“In the past year, at least 1 million children have been enrolled in madrassas for religious education,” said Karamatullah Akhundzada, the deputy minister of education, in a September news conference.  

The year’s new enrollments brought the total to 3.6 million students at more than about 21,000 madrassas registered in the country, 

This shift marks a change in the educational landscape in Afghanistan, where madrassas now outnumber the more than 18,000 public and private schools.  

Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, founding director of the Center for Governance and Markets at the University of Pittsburgh, told VOA that the increase in the number of madrassas is part of the Taliban’s effort to establish control.  

“It’s important to look at madrassas together with local governance. Under the republic [former Afghan government], there was no formal village governance, but the Taliban have replaced that with religious leaders who now hold local power,” Murtazashvili said. 

Before the Taliban seized power in 2021, there were about 5,000 madrassas registered across Afghanistan.  

After returning to power, the Taliban aimed to transform the education system.  

Officials at the Taliban Ministry of Education said they have taken steps to “revise and reform” textbooks and curricula in the schools in the past three years.  

Before the Taliban, more than 9 million students were enrolled in all types of schools, with 39% of them girls.  

Following the Taliban’s return to power, the group imposed a ban on girls’ secondary education, making Afghanistan the only country in the world to restrict girls from attending secondary school.  

The Taliban ban on secondary education deprived about 1.5 million girls of going to school.  

Murtazashvili sees the ban on girls attending school beyond the sixth grade as a clear sign of extremism.  

“By robbing girls of education, they are robbing the country of its future,” Murtazashvili said, adding that “you’re not going to have a future of women nurses and doctors. You’re going to see mortality increase.”  

One young woman who spoke to VOA but did not want her name used was in 11th grade when the Taliban took power in 2021 and banned secondary education for girls.  

She said she enrolled in a madrassa in Herat City, hoping to continue her education, but was “disappointed.”  

“At first, I thought I could learn and reconnect with friends, but it felt more like brainwashing,” she said, adding that “they kept telling us education wasn’t for us. We should become good housewives and give birth to future Islamic leaders.” 

After three months, “disheartened with the restrictive environment,” she quit the madrassa. 

Mohammad Moheq, former Afghan ambassador to Egypt and author of many books on Islam and Afghanistan, told VOA the Taliban push their strict interpretation of Islam through these madrassas.  

“Their goal is to stop people from thinking for themselves and push their strict version of Islam that fits their political agenda,” Moheq said.  

Madrassas played an important role in the Taliban’s rise to power in the late 1990s as many of the Taliban were graduates of madrassas in neighboring Pakistan.  

In April 2022, the Taliban announced their plan to open three to 10 new madrassas in every district in Afghanistan.  

“Religious sciences should be further taught throughout Afghan society,” said Noorullah Mounir, the then-minister of education, as he urged Afghan teachers to instill an “Islamic belief” in their students. 

Saba Hanif, a professor at the University of Education in Lahore, Pakistan, told VOA that there is a need for the international community to talk to the Taliban to find “a middle ground” and blend religious and “worldly” education.  

“They should agree on certain terms and show the Taliban how purely religious education could harm the country’s future, particularly in terms of job opportunities and economic growth,” Hanif said. 

She added that if children are exposed to “only one way of thinking and one way of living life,” it will perpetuate extremism.  

“This will be quite obvious. And it could be very dangerous for the region because, you know, of their past practices. They try to force it on others, and they also don’t hesitate in using power to control others,” Hanif said.
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DruafAfrica

Burkina Faso suspends VOA broadcasts

washington — Authorities in Burkina Faso on Monday suspended Voice of America for three months over comments made by one of the network’s journalists. 

The junta also temporarily banned local news outlets from using any international media reports, the reports said.  

Burkina Faso’s superior council for communication, also known as CSC, accused VOA of demoralizing troops in Burkina Faso and nearby Mali in a broadcast on September 19, according to media reports. The interview was later aired by a privately owned local radio station, according to Reuters.  

In the communique that banned local news outlets from using any international media reports, the CSC said it noted the “dissemination of information of a malicious and biased nature” by national outlets using international media reports.  

In the communique, which did not specifically mention VOA, the CSC said such reports tend to “insidiously apologize for terrorism.”  

The phone number listed online for the CSC was not working. VOA attempted to request comment via an online form on the CSC website, but it returned an error message.  

VOA and its parent organization, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, did not immediately reply to requests for comment. Burkina Faso’s Foreign Ministry did not reply to VOA’s email requesting comment for this story.  

Earlier suspension  

This would not be the first time VOA has been suspended in Burkina Faso.  

Authorities suspended VOA and the BBC in April following the broadcast of news stories about a Human Rights Watch report accusing the Burkinabe army of abuses against civilian populations.

“VOA stands by its reporting about Burkina Faso and intends to continue to fully and fairly cover events in that country,” VOA’s then-acting director John Lippman said in a statement about the April suspension.  

Military leaders in Burkina Faso seized power in a coup in September 2022. Since then, media watchdogs have documented a decline in media freedoms, with media outlets suspended and foreign correspondents expelled.  

In 2021, Burkina Faso ranked 37 out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index, where 1 shows the best media environment. This year, Burkina Faso ranked 86.  
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DruchinaChina

US stresses desire for peaceful resolution of Taiwan disputes

WASHINGTON — A top U.S. official said the United States expects differences across the Taiwan Strait to be resolved peacefully and opposes any unilateral changes to the status quo as Taiwan prepares to celebrate the founding of the Republic of China on Thursday.

The People’s Republic of China, or PRC, celebrates its national day on October 1, marking the founding of the country in 1949. Taiwan chooses October 10, known as Double Ten Day, to celebrate the founding of the ROC in 1912, just months after an uprising that began on October 10, 1911.

The PRC typically closely monitors speeches from Taiwan’s leaders during Double Ten Day celebrations. Since Taiwan’s democratically elected President Lai Ching-te took office in May, Beijing has increased military pressure on Taiwan, deeming Lai a “separatist.”

On Tuesday, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Kritenbrink said that the U.S.’s “fundamental interest is in the maintenance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait,” reiterating that Washington’s longstanding One China policy remains unchanged, “guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three Joint Communiques and the Six Assurances.”

“We oppose unilateral changes to the status quo by either side. We do not support Taiwan independence, and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved peacefully,” Kritenbrink told VOA during a briefing.

Speaking at an event Saturday, Lai noted that the PRC celebrated its 75th anniversary on October 1, and in a few days, it would be the ROC’s 113th birthday.

“In terms of age, it is absolutely impossible for the People’s Republic of China to be considered the motherland of the people of the Republic of China. On the contrary, the ROC may be the motherland of the people of the PRC who are over 75 years old,” Lai told an audience in Taipei.

PRC officials have remained largely muted on Lai’s remarks, but some analysts say that could be because Beijing is preparing to launch another round of military exercises after Lai delivers his Double Ten Day speech.

U.S. officials have referred inquiries to “President Lai’s office for any commentary on his specific comments.”

European visit

Meanwhile, former Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen will visit the Czech Republic this month, a visit seen as sensitive since Beijing has repeatedly denounced the democratic leader as a “separatist.”

In Beijing on Tuesday, a spokesperson from the PRC’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs was asked to comment on Tsai’s planned visit to Prague.

“We firmly oppose anyone who seeks “Taiwan independence” visiting countries with diplomatic ties with China under any pretext. We urge the Czech Republic and relevant countries to earnestly abide by the One China principle and respect China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told reporters Tuesday.

Taiwan has been self-ruled since 1949, when Mao Zedong’s communists took power in Beijing after defeating Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang nationalists in a civil war, prompting the nationalists’ relocation to the island.

The U.S. does not maintain an official relationship with Taiwan but provides defense equipment to the self-ruled democracy under the Taiwan Relations Act.

Treaty of Aigun

In a TV interview in September, Lai remarked that if China’s claims over Taiwan are genuinely rooted in concerns about territorial integrity, it should also seek to reclaim the land it ceded to Russia in the 19th century.

He referenced the 1858 Treaty of Aigun, through which China, under the Qing dynasty, gave up a vast area of land — now part of Russia’s Far East — to the Russian Empire, establishing much of the modern border along the Amur River.

The Treaty of Aigun, along with the 1860 Convention of Peking, saw China relinquish 600,000 square kilometers — an area almost the size of Ukraine — to the Russian Empire, enabling Russia to establish a naval base at Vladivostok. Many Chinese people still brood over this period of history, harboring lingering resentment over the fact that the land once belonged to China before being annexed by Russia.

In 2023, China’s Ministry of Natural Resources mandated that new maps use Chinese names for Vladivostok — Haishenwai — as well as several other cities in the region.
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DruafAfrica

UN Rights Council says human rights in DR Congo on a downward spiral

GENEVA   — Human rights experts warn the human rights situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo, already troubled for decades, is on a downward spiral again as armed clashes, attacks on schools and hospitals, sexual violence and other forms of abuse escalate. 

Kicking off a discussion of the DRC at the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk urged the international community to pay more attention to the plight of Congolese civilians victimized by a “volatile mix of escalating violence, regional and international interests, exploitative businesses and weak rule of law.”

He said the number of victims of human rights violations is growing, with armed groups fighting in the eastern provinces responsible for most of these violations, including “deadly attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals.” 

He said sexual violence is spreading despite efforts to prevent and investigate cases.

“The armed groups take people prisoners, subject women and girls to sexual slavery.  Many of them have been killed after being raped. These cases, of course, have not all been reported. This is atrocious,” he said.

“Human rights violations committed by the defense and security forces during their military operations against armed groups, also remain of concern,” he said noting that hate speech and other incitement to discrimination and violence “are fueling the conflict and increasing political tensions across the country.”

Türk appealed to countries of influence to use their power to ensure the fighting stops, stating that “any role played by Rwanda in supporting the M23 in North Kivu, and by any other country supporting armed groups active in the DRC, must end.” 

Responding to Türk’s comments, DRC Minister of Human Rights Chantal Shambu  Mwavita said her government has made great progress in protecting human rights, in spite of challenges posed by the war in the east. 

Alluding to Rwanda, she pointed her finger at so-called “negative forces” supporting the armed groups from the outside. She “called on the international community to condemn these actions strongly and to impose targeted sanctions on Rwanda for its destabilizing role.”   

Mwavita said the war in the eastern provinces is closely linked to the seizure and illegal exploitation of her country’s natural resources by Rwanda and other countries. 

She also demanded the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Rwandan troops from DRC territory.  

North Kivu and surrounding provinces of the eastern DRC have been wracked by violence for decades, as armed groups battle for control of the region’s rich natural resources.

Rwanda has denied supporting the M23 rebels, with Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe renewing that denial on Saturday. The minister, who was attending a two-day “Francophonie” summit in Paris, accused his Congolese counterpart of refusing to sign “an agreed deal” to resolve the M23 rebel conflict in the DRC.

On Tuesday, Rwanda’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, James Ngango, also expressed concern about the escalation of abuse and human rights violations in the eastern DRC, “particularly sexual violation and violation against children in the region affected by armed conflict and inter community conflicts,” he said.

He said Rwanda remains committed to dialogue and the regional peace processes. He said, “No military solution can address the root causes of the conflict in eastern DRC.”

It is unclear whether the DRC’s demand for the withdrawal of Rwandan forces will be met, nor is it clear if and when MONUSCO, the U.N.’s peacekeeping force, will withdraw from the country as demanded by the government of Felix Tshisekedi.

The U.N. says the peacekeepers, who were supposed to leave by the end of the year, apparently have been given a reprieve. Several thousand soldiers remain in North and South Kivu and Ituri provinces.

Bintou Keita, special representative of the secretary-general in the DRC and head of MONUSCO, made little reference to the potential consequences for the stability of the DRC once U.N. peacekeepers leave the country.

However, she painted a worrying picture of human rights in the DRC due to “the deteriorating security situation” in the eastern provinces from attacks on civilians, “causing loss of human lives and mass displacements of peoples towards Kinshasa and Kisangani.”

“The M23, in the quest for territorial gains, extended its hold on territories towards Lubero Kanyabayonga, which was captured in late June after intense fighting. Hospitals and IDP sites were deliberately targeted by M23. Several civilians fled their homes, further exacerbating the humanitarian crisis,” she said.

She affirmed that MONUSCO “will continue to provide its support to the DRC … in strict conformity with the U.N. human rights due diligence policy, including support for the establishment of the human rights compliance framework.”

Keita added, “The return of peace to the DRC will come about through pooled military and non-military efforts to find lasting solutions, both national and regional.”

Conflict in the DRC has come at a high price. The United Nations said the country is struggling with twin humanitarian crises — an internal displacement crisis and a food crisis. It reports that 7.2 million people currently are internally displaced, and nearly 26 million face acute hunger.
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DruasiaAsia

Jailed Chinese businessman’s daughter asks Xi Jinping to release her father

Washington — The daughter of imprisoned Chinese real estate tycoon Ren Zhiqiang has issued a public appeal to China’s leader, Xi Jinping, asking him to allow her father to seek medical care he needs after his health reportedly deteriorated during his time in jail.

Ren, 73, is a former member of the Chinese Communist Party and chairman of the state-owned Huayuan real estate group. He was jailed after publishing an essay online in March 2020 that criticized the government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In an open letter posted on the social media platform WeChat on October 2, Ren Xinyi appealed to the president’s “humanitarian principles,” requesting that Xi release her father so that he may access treatment for his failing health and spend the last part of his life with his family.

Ren Xinyi described her father as a dangerously ill, old man at risk of dying in jail. She wrote that he had long been suffering from a prostate ailment and was prescribed surgical treatment before his imprisonment. Despite previous requests that her father be allowed to undergo surgery, Ren has not yet been permitted the care his family seeks.

“I am willing to promise that my father will never make any public remarks or content after he goes abroad for treatment. He is over 70 years old and seriously ill. He has no ability to cause trouble to you and the country,” Ren Xinyi told Xi in the letter.

Before his incarceration and in his prime, the former businessman was nicknamed “Cannon Ren,” a name he gained for how frequently, and publicly, he called party policy into question. But for his release, Ren’s daughter writes that her father won’t go back to his old ways.

In a translated version of the essay that prompted his arrest, Ren wrote: “The reality shown by this epidemic is that the party defends its own interests, the government officials defend their own interests, and the monarch only defends the status and interests of the core.”

The businessman also called for freedom of speech so that citizens could better protect themselves through open discourse.

In a secretive trial, Ren was sentenced to 18 years in jail on counts of corruption, bribery and embezzlement of public funds. He was also fined about $600,000.

His daughter’s letter was initially published to a WeChat group that included friends of Ren. One of the group’s members, political commentator and U.S. resident Cai Shenkun, confirmed to VOA that pictures released of the letter were genuine.

“In the past few years, some friends and people from all walks of life have tried to help Ren, because after all, Ren was a bold and outspoken person in the past,” said Cai.

Anna Wang, founder of Photon Media and a former business owner in China, also confirmed the authenticity of the letter with several friends in Beijing familiar with Ren Zhiqiang.  

“This letter is very powerful, and it’s also a call to action,” Wang said. “I think this daughter is also very brave.”

“In China, if you want to live a life of despicable behavior, you can live well,” she continued. “But if you want to engage in any activities that promote national progress and democracy, it will come at a painful and huge price.”

In a final plea for Xi’s kindness, the letter concluded, “President Xi Jinping, we have previously raised the above request several times through normal channels but have never received a good response. We have no choice but to use this method to reflect our desperate request to you.”

The Chinese government has not publicly commented on the open petition from Ren’s daughter. 

When asked by VOA to comment on the letter, a spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington D.C. said: “the Chinese government protects the lawful rights of every citizen in accordance with the law.”

(Katherine Michaelson contributed to this story.)
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DruamAmericas

New book says Trump secretly sent COVID tests to Putin

Washington — Then-president Donald Trump secretly sent COVID test kits to Vladimir Putin despite a U.S. shortage during the pandemic, and spoke multiple times with the Russian leader after leaving office, says an explosive new book by Bob Woodward. 

The upcoming opus, War, also chronicles some of President Joe Biden’s own acknowledged missteps and his struggle to prevent escalation of conflict in the Middle East, including exasperation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over futile efforts to get Israel and Hamas to reach a cease-fire. 

In excerpts published Tuesday by The Washington Post, where he is an associate editor, Woodward lays out damning details and actions by Trump, who the writer says has retained a personal relationship with Putin even as Trump campaigns for another presidential term and the Russian president conducts a war against Ukraine, a U.S. ally. 

With the coronavirus ravaging the world in 2020, Trump sent a batch of test kits to his counterpart in Moscow. Putin accepted the supplies but sought to avoid political fallout for Trump, urging that he not reveal the dispatch of medical equipment, this book says. 

According to Woodward, Putin told Trump: “I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me.” 

Woodward also cites an unnamed Trump aide in the book who indicated the Republican flag bearer may have spoken to Putin up to seven times since leaving the White House in 2021.  

The Post, reporting Woodward’s account, said that at one point in early 2024, Trump ordered an aide out of his office in his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida so he could hold a private call with Putin. 

War is set for publication on Oct. 15, just three weeks before a critical U.S. election in which Trump is locked in a tight race against Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee. 

While Harris does make appearances in the book, she is seen in a supporting role to Biden “and hardly determining foreign policy herself,” the Post reported. 

Woodward has chronicled American presidencies for 50 years, and this is his fourth book since Trump’s upset victory in 2016. He began his presidential reportages with Richard Nixon, who was undone by the 1970s Watergate scandal exposed by Woodward and Post colleague Carl Bernstein. 

Woodward concluded that Trump’s interactions, detailed in the book, with an authoritarian president at war with a U.S. ally make him more unfit to be president than Nixon. 

“Trump was the most reckless and impulsive president in American history and is demonstrating the very same character as a presidential candidate in 2024,” Woodward wrote. 

The Trump campaign blasted the book as “trash” and “made up stories.” 

They are “the work of a truly demented and deranged man who suffers from a debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” campaign communications director Steven Cheung told AFP. 

According to CNN, which obtained a pre-release book copy, Woodward repeatedly quotes Biden dropping F bombs as he discusses his personal and political challenges. 

Biden called Putin “the epitome of evil,” blasted Netanyahu as a “liar” and said he “should never have picked” Merrick Garland as U.S. attorney general. 

According to the book, during an April phone call Biden turned testy with Netanyahu. 

“What’s your strategy, man?” Biden asked the Israeli leader, according to Woodward. 

“We have to go into Rafah,” Netanyahu said, referring to a city in southern Gaza. 

“Bibi, you’ve got no strategy,” Biden responded.
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DruchinaChina

US states sue TikTok, saying it harms young users

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON — TikTok faces new lawsuits filed by 13 U.S. states and the District of Columbia on Tuesday, accusing the popular social media platform of harming and failing to protect young people.

The lawsuits, filed separately in New York, California, the District of Columbia and 11 other states, expand Chinese-owned TikTok’s legal fight with U.S. regulators and seek new financial penalties against the company.

Washington is located in the District of Columbia.

The states accuse TikTok of using intentionally addictive software designed to keep children watching as long and often as possible and misrepresenting its content moderation effectiveness.

“TikTok cultivates social media addiction to boost corporate profits,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement. “TikTok intentionally targets children because they know kids do not yet have the defenses or capacity to create healthy boundaries around addictive content.”

TikTok seeks to maximize the amount of time users spend on the app in order to target them with ads, the states said.

“Young people are struggling with their mental health because of addictive social media platforms like TikTok,” said New York Attorney General Letitia James.

TikTok said on Tuesday that it strongly disagreed with the claims, “many of which we believe to be inaccurate and misleading,” and that it was disappointed the states chose to sue “rather than work with us on constructive solutions to industrywide challenges.”

TikTok provides safety features that include default screentime limits and privacy defaults for minors under 16, the company said.

Washington, D.C., Attorney General Brian Schwalb alleged that TikTok operates an unlicensed money transmission business through its livestreaming and virtual currency features.

“TikTok’s platform is dangerous by design. It’s an intentionally addictive product that is designed to get young people addicted to their screens,” Schwalb said in an interview.

Washington’s lawsuit accused TikTok of facilitating sexual exploitation of underage users, saying TikTok’s livestreaming and virtual currency “operate like a virtual strip club with no age restrictions.”

Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Vermont and Washington state also sued on Tuesday.

In March 2022, eight states, including California and Massachusetts, said they launched a nationwide probe of TikTok impacts on young people.

The U.S. Justice Department sued TikTok in August for allegedly failing to protect children’s privacy on the app. Other states, including Utah and Texas, previously sued TikTok for failing to protect children from harm. TikTok on Monday rejected the allegations in a court filing.

TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, is battling a U.S. law that could ban the app in the United States.
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DruafAfrica

US slaps sanctions on Sudan paramilitary leader

Washington — The United States on Tuesday announced sanctions against a senior leader in war-torn Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for his role in obtaining weapons for the paramilitary organization.

Tens of thousands of people have died and millions have been displaced since war broke out in April 2023 between Sudan’s army and the RSF after their head generals refused a plan to integrate.

Algoney Hamdan Daglo Musa was sanctioned “for his involvement in RSF efforts to procure weapons and other military materiel that have enabled the RSF’s ongoing operations in Sudan,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement.

His actions have fueled war in Sudan “and brutal RSF atrocities against civilians, which have included war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing,” Miller said.

The U.S. Treasury said that as a result of such sanctions “all property and interests in property of the designated persons… that are in the United States or in the possession or control of US persons are blocked and must be reported.”

The United States has led diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting in Sudan but has seen limited success and leverage, with RSF commanders unlikely to hold major assets in the West that would be affected by sanctions.
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DruasiaAsia

Maldives, India reset ties troubled by Maldivian leader’s pro-China stance

India and the Maldives have reset ties that plummeted as Maldivian President Mohammed Muizzu leaned toward China after taking office a year ago. Muizzu’s outreach to India during a visit to New Delhi comes amid an economic downturn in his tiny country. Anjana Pasricha reports from New Delhi.
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DruafAfrica

Eswatini groups call for ‘hit list’ of game rangers accused of shooting poaching suspects with impunity

Mbabane, Eswatini — The main opposition party in Eswatini is compiling a “hit list” of game rangers in response to what it says are state-sanctioned murders of suspected poachers. Communities have been urged to assist in identifying rangers involved in the killings. As tensions mount over poaching-related deaths in Eswatini, the fear of violence looms large. 

Although there is no definitive count of suspected poachers killed in Eswatini’s game parks, the Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs estimates that dozens are slain each year. 

However, Eswatini’s opposition parties allege hundreds of families have been impacted by these deaths and have called for a compilation of a game ranger “hit list.” 

Velephi Mamba, treasurer general of main opposition party PUDEMO, one of the groups calling for possible violence against the rangers, said the news of the list of game rangers that was announced a week ago still stands. In fact, he said, it’s an ongoing issue. Mamba said his party request that all Swazis compile a list of the names of game rangers that are killing our people.

Amid the growing controversy, legislators and human rights activists in Eswatini recently demanded an urgent review of the Game Act of 1991. They say the law allows game rangers in the southern African kingdom to shoot suspected poachers in national parks with little or no consequence.

Human rights lawyer Sibusiso Nhlabatsi is among those calling for revision of the law. He said game rangers need to make greater efforts to arrest suspected poachers and bring them to court, rather than killing or torturing them.

“The game rangers themselves should understand that they should prioritize the use of non-lethal methods for the apprehension when dealing with suspected poachers,” Nhlabatsi said. “The use of excessive force, in my view, does not only violate human rights but also undermines the credibility of the conservation efforts.”

Mandla Motsa, a game ranger in Eswatini, defended his colleagues’ actions, saying there is an urgent need to protect endangered species in the parks from extinction, and that rangers face a formidable threat from well-armed poachers. There have been multiple reported incidents of rangers and poachers exchanging gunfire. 

“We are getting a lot of pressure from poachers who are always armed and attacking the rangers on duty, while we have got organizations who feel like the poachers should be allowed to do whatever they are doing, which is against the work the rangers are doing,” Motsa said.

Meanwhile, Eswatini government spokesperson Alpheous Nxumalo condemned the calls for a “hit list” and urged citizens to shun requests to provide names. He emphasized the importance of following due process and the rule of law for achieving justice.

“Nobody should heed to such calls because they are going to lead into an escalation of violence in our communities around the country, and we know that that is the kind of atmosphere they want to create around the kingdom of Eswatini,” Nxumalo said.

Legislators have begun discussing reforms to the Game Act of 1991 but so far there have been no amendments proposed, and no votes scheduled as of yet.
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Biggest Kashmir party opposed to India’s stripping of region’s autonomy wins most seats in election 

SRINAGAR, Indian-administered Kashmir — Kashmir’s biggest political party opposed to India’s stripping of the region’s semi-autonomy won the most seats in a local election, official data showed Tuesday, in a vote seen as a referendum against the move by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government.

National Conference, or NC, won 42 seats, mainly from the Kashmir Valley, the heartland of the anti-India rebellion, according to the data. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party secured 29 seats, all from the Hindu-dominated areas of Jammu.

India’s main opposition Congress party, which fought the election in alliance with the NC, succeeded in six constituencies.

“People have supported us more than our expectations. Now our efforts will be to prove that we are worth these votes,” Omar Abdullah, the NC leader and the region’s former chief minister, told reporters in the main city of Srinagar.

His father and president of the party, Farooq Abdullah, said that the mandate was to run the region without “police raj [rule]” and try freeing people from jails. “Media will be free,” he said. “People have given their mandate, they have proven that they don’t accept the decision that was taken on August 5,” he added referring to India’s move in August 2019.

The vote will allow Kashmir to have its own truncated government and a regional legislature, called an assembly, rather than being directly under New Delhi’s rule.

However, there will be a limited transition of power from New Delhi to the assembly as Kashmir will remain a “union territory” — directly controlled by the federal government — with India’s Parliament as its main legislator. Kashmir’s statehood must be restored for the new government to have powers similar to other states of India.

Hundreds of the NC workers gathered outside counting centers and at the homes of the winning candidates to celebrate the party’s victory.

It was the first such vote in a decade and the first since Modi’s Hindu nationalist government scrapped the Muslim-majority region’s long-held semi-autonomy in 2019.

The unprecedented move downgraded and divided the former state into two centrally governed union territories, Ladakh and Jammu-Kashmir. Both are ruled directly by New Delhi through its appointed administrators along with unelected bureaucrats and security setup. The move — which largely resonated in India and among Modi supporters — was mostly opposed in Kashmir as an assault on its identity and autonomy amid fears that it would pave the way for demographic changes in the region.

The region has since been on edge with civil liberties curbed and media gagged.

India and Pakistan each administer a part of Kashmir, but both claim the territory in its entirety. The nuclear-armed rivals have fought two of their three wars over the territory since they gained independence from British colonial rule in 1947.

Authorities tallied votes as thousands of additional police and paramilitary soldiers patrolled roads and guarded 28 counting centers. Nearly 8.9 million people were eligible to vote in the election, which began on Sept. 18 and concluded on Oct. 1. The overall turnout was 64% across the three phases, according to official data.

In the region’s legislature, five seats are appointed and 90 elected, so a party or coalition would need at least 48 of the 95 total seats to form a government. The alliance of the National Conference and the Congress have 48 seats combined.

Authorities have said the election will bring democracy to the region after decades of strife, but many locals viewed the vote as an opportunity not only to elect their own representatives but also to register their protest against the 2019 changes.

Except for the BJP, most parties who contested the election campaigned on promises to reverse the 2019 changes and address key issues like rising unemployment and inflation. The Congress party favored restoring the region’s statehood. The BJP has also stated that it will restore statehood, but has not told when it would do.

The BJP has vowed to block any move aimed at undoing most of the 2019 changes but promised to help in the region’s economic development.

Meanwhile, Modi’s BJP appears to be heading for a victory in the northern state of Haryana, bordering New Delhi, which it has ruled for 10 years, leading in 50 constituencies and the Congress in 35 out of 90.

The BJP has so far won 18 seats and is leading in 32 constituencies while the Congress has won 15 seats and is leading in 20, according to the Election Commission of India.

A victory would give the BJP a record third five-year term in the state.

The voting trend in Haryana state is a surprise since most exit polls had predicted an easy victory for the Congress party.

Kashmir’s last assembly election was held in 2014, after which the BJP for the first time ruled in a coalition with the local Peoples Democratic Party. But the government collapsed in 2018 after the BJP withdrew from the coalition.

Polls in the past have been marked with violence, boycotts and vote-rigging, even though India called them a victory over separatism.

Militants in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhi’s rule since 1989. Many Muslim Kashmiris support the rebels’ goal of uniting the territory, either under Pakistani rule or as an independent country.

India insists the Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. Pakistan denies the charge, and many Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict.
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DruamAmericas

Blinken heads to Laos for ASEAN and East Asia Summit

State Department — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to visit Vientiane, Laos, later this week for meetings with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, where he is expected to engage directly with newly elected leaders from the Indo-Pacific.

Blinken will represent President Joe Biden at this year’s ASEAN-U.S. Summit and participate in the East Asia Summit, where leaders and senior officials from India, Japan, South Korea, and the People’s Republic of China are also expected to attend.

This week’s ASEAN summits will feature the debut of Paetongtarn Shinawatra, 38, who became Thailand’s prime minister in mid-August. She will make her first bilateral visit to Laos on Tuesday and will be the youngest Southeast Asian leader at the summit.

Singapore has also seen a generational shift with Lawrence Wong succeeding longtime Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in May.

Japan’s new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba took office on October 1. He has pledged to strengthen his country’s alliance with the U.S. during a call with President Biden last Wednesday.

“I am grateful for the prime minister’s commitment to the U.S.-Japan Alliance and look forward to working with his government to reinforce the enduring partnership between our two nations,” Blinken said in a statement last week.

Ishiba is also in discussions with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol about holding a meeting on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit.

Regional security, development and trade — including the creation of resilient semiconductor supply chains — are expected to be top priorities on the U.S. agenda.

In 2023, total two-way merchandise trade between the United States and ASEAN reached $395.9 billion, making the U.S. the second-largest trading partner after China. Additionally, the U.S. is ASEAN’s largest source of foreign direct investment, which amounted to $74.3 billion last year.

Susannah Patton, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Sydney-based think tank Lowy Institute, said that this year’s East Asia Summit must address contentious global issues such as the conflict in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The East Asia Summit comprises ASEAN’s 10 member countries and eight major dialogue partners, including the United States, China typically represented by Premier Li Qiang, and Russia represented by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

In a recent analysis published by the Lowy Institute, Patton noted that it is likely that the “ASEAN show will come to Laos and then roll on again,” adding that “concrete progress on pressing issues will be sorely lacking.”

“While the EAS is still likely to issue at least one jointly negotiated statement in 2024,” Patton wrote, “it is a reflection of global political polarization that ASEAN’s dialogue partners are no longer able to propose their own dueling statements to advance their preferred language on international issues.”
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DruamAmericas

Pioneers in artificial intelligence win the Nobel Prize in physics 

STOCKHOLM — Two pioneers of artificial intelligence — John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton — won the Nobel Prize in physics Tuesday for helping create the building blocks of machine learning that is revolutionizing the way we work and live but also creates new threats to humanity, one of the winners said.

Hinton, who is known as the “godfather of artificial intelligence,” is a citizen of Canada and Britain who works at the University of Toronto. Hopfield is an American working at Princeton.

“This year’s two Nobel Laureates in physics have used tools from physics to develop methods that are the foundation of today’s powerful machine learning,” the Nobel committee said in a press release.

Ellen Moons, a member of the Nobel committee at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, said the two laureates “used fundamental concepts from statistical physics to design artificial neural networks that function as associative memories and find patterns in large data sets.”

She said that such networks have been used to advance research in physics and “have also become part of our daily lives, for instance in facial recognition and language translation.”

Hinton predicted that AI will end up having a “huge influence” on civilization, bringing improvements in productivity and health care.

“It would be comparable with the Industrial Revolution,” he said in the open call with reporters and the officials from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

“Instead of exceeding people in physical strength, it’s going to exceed people in intellectual ability. We have no experience of what it’s like to have things smarter than us. And it’s going to be wonderful in many respects,” Hinton said. “But we also have to worry about a number of possible bad consequences, particularly the threat of these things getting out of control.”

The Nobel committee that honored the science behind machine learning and AI also mentioned fears about its possible flipside. Moon said that while it has “enormous benefits, its rapid development has also raised concerns about our future. Collectively, humans carry the responsibility for using this new technology in a safe and ethical way for the greatest benefit of humankind.”

Hinton shares those concerns. He quit a role at Google so he could more freely speak about the dangers of the technology he helped create.

On Tuesday, he said he was shocked at the honor.

“I’m flabbergasted. I had, no idea this would happen,” he said when reached by the Nobel committee on the phone.

There was no immediate reaction from Hopfield.

Hinton, now 76, in the 1980s helped develop a technique known as backpropagation that has been instrumental in training machines how to “learn.”

His team at the University of Toronto later wowed peers by using a neural network to win the prestigious ImageNet computer vision competition in 2012. That win spawned a flurry of copycats, giving birth to the rise of modern AI.

Hopfield, 91, created an associative memory that can store and reconstruct images and other types of patterns in data, the Nobel committee said.

Hinton used Hopfield’s network as the foundation for a new network that uses a different method, known as the Boltzmann machine, that the committee said can learn to recognize characteristic elements in a given type of data.

Six days of Nobel announcements opened Monday with Americans Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun winning the medicine prize for their discovery of tiny bits of genetic material that serve as on and off switches inside cells that help control what the cells do and when they do it. If scientists can better understand how they work and how to manipulate them, it could one day lead to powerful treatments for diseases like cancer.

The physics prize carries a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million) from a bequest left by the award’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel. The laureates are invited to receive their awards at ceremonies on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death.

Nobel announcements continue with the chemistry physics prize on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday and the economics award on Oct. 14.
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DruchinaChina

China targets brandy in EU trade tit-for-tat after EV tariff move

Beijing/Paris — China imposed temporary anti-dumping measures on imports of brandy from the EU on Tuesday, hitting French brands including Hennessy and Remy Martin, days after the 27-state bloc voted for tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles, or EVs.

China’s commerce ministry said preliminary findings of an investigation had determined that dumping of brandy from the European Union threatens “substantial damage” to its own sector.

France’s trade ministry said the temporary Chinese measures were “incomprehensible” and violated free trade, and that it would work with the European Commission to challenge the move at the World Trade Organization.

In a sign of the rising trade tensions, China’s ministry added in another statement on Tuesday that an ongoing anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigation into EU pork products would make “objective and fair” decisions when it concludes.

It also said that it was considering a hike in tariffs on imports of large-engine vehicles, which would hit German producers hardest. German exports of vehicles with engines of 2.5 liters or larger to China reached $1.2 billion last year.

France was seen as the target of Beijing’s brandy probe due to its support of tariffs on China-made EVs. French brandy shipments to China reached $1.7 billion last year and accounted for 99% of the country’s imports of the spirit.

As of Oct. 11, importers of brandy originating in the EU will have to put down security deposits mostly ranging from 34.8% to 39.0% of the import value, the ministry said.

“This announcement clearly shows that China is determined to tax us in response to European decisions on Chinese electric vehicles,” French cognac producers group BNIC said in an email.

French President Emmanuel Macron said last week that China’s brandy probe was “pure retaliation,” while EV tariffs were needed to preserve a level playing field.

Shares tumble

LVMH-owned Hennessy and Remy Martin were among the brands hardest hit by the measures, with importers having to pay security deposits of 39.0% and 38.1%, respectively.

The deposits would make it more costly upfront to import brandy from the EU. However they could be returned if a deal is eventually reached before definitive tariffs are imposed.

Both the investigation and negotiations remain ongoing, said an executive at a leading cognac company, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.

Chinese investigators visited producers in France last month and were due to make further site visits, the executive said, while Chinese and EU officials held negotiations on Monday.

The outcome was unclear, however, and doubts around the EU’s willingness to make a deal were emerging, they added.

Shares in Pernod Ricard were down 4.2% at 0839 GMT, while Remy Cointreau’s dropped 8.7% and shares in LVMH fell 4.9%.

Companies that cooperated with China’s investigation were hit with security deposit rates of 34.8%, with that imposed on Martell the lowest at 30.6%.

Pernod Ricard, Remy Cointreau and LVMH did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The measures could mean a 20% price rise for consumers in China, said Jefferies analysts, reducing sales volumes by 20%.

Remy, with the greatest exposure to the Chinese market, could see its sales decline by 6%, with Pernod group sales seeing a 1.6% impact, they said.

China is the second largest export market for cognac after the United States but is the industry’s most profitable territory. Difficult economic conditions in both markets have already prompted a sharp decline in cognac sales.

James Sym, fund manager at Remy investor River Global, said despite this, there was no sign that demand for cognac had fundamentally changed, pointing to an uptick in cognac sales in Japan driven by Chinese tourists when the yen was weak.

“That’s obviously a sign that cognac is not out of fashion,” he said, adding volumes – and the companies’ share prices – should recover long-term, although the tariffs would likely hit volumes and margins while in place.

Talks continue

Luxury goods shares fell by as much as 7% on Tuesday, with one trader attributing this to fears that the sector, which is heavily reliant on China, could be next to see trade measures.

The brandy measures follow a vote by the EU to adopt tariffs on China-made EVs by the end of October.

Before the vote in late August, China had suspended its planned anti-dumping measures on EU brandy, in an apparent goodwill gesture, despite determining it had been sold in China at below-market prices.

At the time, the commerce ministry said its probe would end before Jan. 5, 2025, but that it could be extended.

China’s commerce ministry previously said it had found that European distillers had been selling brandy in its 1.4 billion-strong consumer market at a dumping margin in the range of 30.6% to 39% and that its domestic industry had been damaged.

In the EU’s decision to impose tariffs on China-made EVs, the bloc set tariff rates on top of the 10% car import duty ranging from 7.8% for Tesla to 35.3% for SAIC and other producers deemed not to have cooperated with its investigation.

The European Commission has said it is willing to continue negotiating an alternative, even after tariffs are imposed.
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DruafAfrica

Mozambique election winner faces tough financial squeeze

JOHANNESBURG — Whoever wins Mozambique’s presidential election on Wednesday will face an economy battered by worsening cyclones, insecurity, delays to planned gas projects and high levels of debt.

Ruling party candidate Daniel Chapo is the frontrunner, though there are three other candidates vying to replace Felipe Nyusi as president of the southeast African nation.

Rising borrowing costs are putting pressure on Mozambique to embrace fiscal discipline, particularly as delayed gas revenues mean it is running out of options to refinance its debt – which is nearly as big as its annual GDP.

“Debt in the country is rocketing,” Gabriel Muthisse, a former transport and communications minister, told Reuters. “Debt servicing is (diverting)…resources that could be used to finance the real economy.”

The yield on Mozambique’s international bond due 2031 stands at close to 13%.

The country of 34 million people is still trying to shake off a decade-old “tuna bonds” scandal involving Credit Suisse, in which loans for a fishing fleet went missing, leading Mozambique to default on its debt and the International Monetary Fund to suspend lending.

Last year, the Swiss bank settled out of court.

“Financing options for the deficit are limited,” said Kevin Daly, portfolio manager at Abrdn, which holds Mozambique’s 2031 international bond.

Mozambique struck a $456 million deal with the IMF in May 2022, but its program expires next year and will have to be renegotiated.

“The future of the economy is really based on the development of these oil and gas…(fields),” said Thys Louw, portfolio manager at global asset manager, Ninety One. Yet Islamist violence has delayed TotalEnergies and ExxonMobil’s development of some of Africa’s biggest gas fields.

Total says it is still committed to them, but investor enthusiasm is waning.

“There was a time where everyone was excited and waiting to go into Mozambique,” said Tshepo Ncube, head of International Coverage at Absa Corporate and Investment Bank.

“Now it is all about: ‘let’s see how it plays out’.”
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DruchinaChina

China is oversupplying lithium to eliminate rivals, US official says 

LISBON — Chinese lithium producers are flooding the global market with the critical metal and causing a “predatory” price drop as they seek to eliminate competing projects, a senior U.S. official said on a visit to Portugal that has ample lithium reserves.

Jose Fernandez, undersecretary for economic growth, energy and the environment at the U.S. Department of State, told a briefing late on Monday that China was producing much more lithium “than the world needs today, by far.”

“That is an intentional response by the People’s Republic of China to what we are trying to do” with the Inflation Reduction Act – the largest climate and energy investment package in U.S. history valued at over $400 billion, Fernandez said.

“They engage in predatory pricing… [they] lower the price until competition disappears,’’ Fernandez said. ‘’That is what is happening.”

China accounts for about two-thirds of the world’s lithium chemical output, which is mainly used in battery technologies including for electric cars. Prices of lithium have fallen more than 80% in the past year largely due to overproduction from China and a drop in demand for electric vehicles.

However, the price collapse is also affecting China as it has forced Chinese companies like battery giant CATL to suspend production at certain mines.

Job cuts

Europe aims to reduce its dependence on imports from China and other countries of lithium and other materials essential to the green transition.

Fernandez said the low price “constrains our ability to diversify our supply chains on a broad, global scale” and also hurts countries such as Portugal that need investment to develop these industries.

Falling prices have forced many global lithium producers to scale back production and cut jobs.

Portugal, with some 60,000 tons of known reserves, is already Europe’s biggest producer of lithium, traditionally mined for ceramics.

Along with neighboring Spain, the country wants to take advantage of local lithium deposits, aiming to cover the entire value chain from mining and refining to cell and battery manufacturing to battery recycling.

Several mining companies in Portugal have been looking for financing, customers and suppliers to crank up projects.

“We want to help them, and we think we can… lithium mining companies, everywhere, have to survive this difficult phase that was created by predatory pricing,” Fernandez said.

China’s Premier Li Qiang in June used his address at a World Economic Forum meeting in Dalian to hit back at accusations from the United States and E.U. that Chinese firms benefit from unfair subsidies and are poised to flood their markets with cheap green technologies.

Trade tensions intensified last Friday when the European Union said it would press ahead with hefty tariffs on China-made electric vehicles to counter what it sees as unfair Chinese subsidies, after a year-long anti-subsidy investigation. China on Tuesday imposed temporary anti-dumping measures on imports of brandy from the E.U.
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DruasiaAsia

Skechers opens store in Xinjiang amid scrutiny over Uyghur forced labor sanctions    

Washington — Despite ongoing U.S. sanctions targeting Chinese companies linked to Uyghur forced labor in Xinjiang, United States-based footwear and apparel company Skechers opened a new outlet in Urumqi, the region’s capital.

The store opened on September 28, days before Chinese national holiday week, one of the country’s busiest shopping periods.

Its opening has drawn criticism from human rights advocates who question Skechers’ decision to expand its presence in a region under international scrutiny and subject to U.S. import bans on goods tied to forced labor.

Jewher Ilham, forced labor project coordinator at the Worker Rights Consortium, expressed concern over Skechers’ decision.

“By opening a store in the Uyghur region, Skechers is making a shocking statement that it does not care about human rights,” she said.

Skechers did not respond to multiple requests for comment from VOA.

Xinjiang, in northwest China, has been at the center of international controversy over allegations of human rights abuses against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim minorities, including forced labor, mass incarceration and repression — claims Chinese authorities have consistently denied. Xinjiang produces one-fifth of the world’s cotton.

In response, the United States passed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act in 2022, which bars goods from Xinjiang unless proven to be free of forced labor.

Skechers promoted its Urumqi store opening heavily on Chinese social media, with actor and brand ambassador Donnie Yen encouraging his nearly 130 million followers on Weibo to visit the outlet and explore its “comfortable treasures.”

Yen did not respond to multiple media inquiries from VOA regarding his visit to Xinjiang or his views on the treatment of Uyghurs by Chinese authorities.

Timothy Grose, an associate professor of China studies at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, pointed out that “from a profit-seeking perspective, of course, Donnie Yen makes sense, especially since nearly 75% of Urumqi’s population is Han Chinese.”

“Unfortunately, few Han are either fully aware or are concerned about state violence against the Uyghurs, so I doubt they will be judging Donnie Yen’s appearance with their moral compasses,” he told VOA.

Corporate responsibility

This isn’t the first time Skechers has faced scrutiny over alleged ties to forced labor in Xinjiang.

In response to a 2020 report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute alleging its supplier employed Uyghur workers under coercive conditions, Skechers denied the allegations. The company said audits of its supplier, Dong Guan Lu Zhou Shoes, found no evidence of forced labor, and that Uyghur workers were employed under the same terms as other employees.

Skechers’ recent move comes as the U.S. continues to intensify its efforts to eliminate forced labor from global supply chains. On October 2, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security added two more Chinese companies to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List, bringing the total number of restricted entities to 75.

“Today’s actions reaffirm our commitment to eliminating forced labor from U.S. supply chains and upholding our values of human rights for all,” DHS undersecretary for policy Robert Silvers said in a statement on the DHS website. “No sector is off-limits. We will continue to identify entities across industries and hold accountable those who seek to profit from exploitation and abuse.”

Chinese pushback

In China, Western companies that publicly declared a break from sourcing products from Xinjiang have long faced backlash from Chinese consumers.

In September, PVH, parent company of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger, became the first Western firm investigated by Chinese authorities, who accused the company of violating Chinese law by allegedly halting the purchase of cotton and garments from Xinjiang.

Corporate responsibility in Xinjiang has become a contentious issue. Grose pointed out that companies like Skechers may view doing business in Xinjiang and China as a safe financial bet, despite human rights concerns.

The company’s actions are a stark reminder that companies should be held accountable not just by governments but by consumers, as well, said Adrian Zenz, a senior fellow and director in China studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation.

“[B]rands are simply out for profit, with no regard to human rights,” he said. “Western consumers are not showing much outrage over this. There is little backlash, so they will do it,” Zenz said.
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China state planner is ‘fully confident’ of achieving 2024 economic goals

BEIJING — China is “fully confident” of achieving its full-year economic and social development targets, with some funds from 2025’s budget being brought forward to support projects, chairman of the country’s economic planner Zheng Shanjie said on Tuesday.

China stocks blasted to two-year highs after a slew of stimulus steps announced in recent weeks supported sentiment in early trade, but later retreated. Hong Kong shares also slid as investors walked back some of the stimulus excitement.

Zheng, chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), told a press conference China’s economy remains largely stable but is facing more complex internal and external environments.

“The international market is volatile, global trade protectionism has intensified, and uncertain and unstable factors have increased. These will have an adverse impact on my country through trade, investment, finance and other channels,” Zheng said.

Downward pressure on the domestic economy has increased, he added.

To support local governments, China will issue $14.12 billion from next year’s central government budget and another $14.12 billion for key investment projects by the end of this year, Zheng said.

The country will also quicken fiscal spending and “all sides should keep making efforts more forcefully” to strengthen macroeconomic policies, he added.

Investors and economists expect more policy support on the fiscal side to sustain the market’s optimism. They said it will take time to restore consumer and business confidence and get the economy back on more solid footing. A housing market recovery, in particular, could be a long slog.

“We anticipate that the government will arrange 1-3 trillion yuan of additional fiscal support this year and next to boost the real economy, recapitalise banks, and stabilize the property market,” said Yue Su, principal China economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit.

“This, along with investments from special long-term bonds planned for next year, is expected to primarily impact 2025’s economic growth.”

The government set a growth target of around 5% this year, but economic indicators showed growth momentum waned since the second quarter, weighing on households spending and business sentiment amid a severe property downturn.

A private report by recruiting platform Zhaopin showed on Tuesday that average pay offered by recruiters in China’s 38 major cities fell 2.5% in the third quarter from the second, and down 0.6% from a year earlier.

In an effort to reverse the economic downturn, China unveiled in late September its most aggressive monetary stimulus package since the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with extensive property market support.

Zheng said that to address insufficient domestic demand, policymakers will focus on enhancing people’s livelihood to stimulate consumption and investment, such as supporting disadvantaged people, consumer goods trade-ins, elderly care and births. No further details were announced.

Vice Chairman of the NDRC, Liu Sushe, stated that most of the 6 trillion yuan in government investment this year was allocated to specific projects, with 90% of local government special bonds used for project construction issued by September.

At the same press conference, another vice chairman of the NDRC, Zhao Chenxin, said that China’s economic growth remained “generally stable” over the first three quarters.
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Milton could strike Florida Wednesday

FORT MYERS BEACH, Fla. — Florida’s Gulf Coast braced Tuesday for the impact of Hurricane Milton’s near-record winds and expected massive storm surge, which could bring destruction to areas already reeling from Helene’s devastation 12 days ago and still recovering from Ian’s wrath two years ago.

Almost the entirety of Florida’s west coast was under a hurricane warning early Tuesday as the Category 5 storm and its 265 kph winds crept toward the state at 14 kph, sucking energy from the Gulf of Mexico’s warm water. The strongest Atlantic hurricane on record is 1980’s Allen, which reached wind speeds of 306 kph as it moved through the Caribbean and Gulf before striking Texas and Mexico.

Milton’s center could come ashore Wednesday in the Tampa Bay region, which has not endured a direct hit by a major hurricane in more than a century. Scientists expect the system to weaken slightly before landfall, though it could retain hurricane strength as it churns across central Florida toward the Atlantic Ocean. That would largely spare other states ravaged by Helene, which killed at least 230 people on its path from Florida to the Appalachian Mountains.

Tampa Bay has not been hit directly by a major hurricane since 1921, and authorities fear luck is about to run out for the region and its 3.3 million residents. President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for Florida, and U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor said 7,000 federal workers were mobilized to help in one of the largest mobilizations of federal personnel in history.

“This is the real deal here with Milton,” Tampa Mayor Jane Castor told a Monday news conference. “If you want to take on Mother Nature, she wins 100% of the time.”

The Tampa Bay area is still rebounding from Helene and its powerful surge — a wall of water up to 2.4 meters it created even though its eye was 160 kilometers offshore. Twelve people died there, with the worst damage along a string of barrier islands from St. Petersburg to Clearwater.

Forecasters warned that Milton could bring a possible 2.4- to 3.6-meter storm surge, leading to evacuation orders being issued for beach communities all along the Gulf coast. In Florida, that means anyone who stays is on their own and first responders are not expected to risk their lives to rescue them at the height of the storm.

Stragglers were a problem during Helene and 2022’s Ian. Many residents failed to heed ample warnings, saying they evacuated during previous storms only to have major surges not materialize. But there was evidence Monday that people were getting out before Milton arrives.

A steady stream of vehicles headed north toward the Florida Panhandle on Interstate 75, the main highway on the west side of the peninsula, as residents heeded evacuation orders. Traffic clogged the southbound lanes of the highway for miles as other residents headed for the relative safety of Fort Lauderdale and Miami on the other side of the state.

About 240 kilometers south of Tampa, Fort Myers Beach was nearly a ghost town by Monday afternoon as an evacuation order took effect. Ian devastated the 5,000-resident community two years ago, its 4.5-meter storm surge destroying or severely damaging 400 homes and businesses. Fourteen people died there as they tried to ride out the storm, and dozens had to be rescued.

On Monday, the few residents who could be found were racing against the clock to safeguard their buildings and belongings. None said they were staying.

The signs of Ian’s devastation remain visible everywhere. Rebuilt homes stand next to others in various states of construction. There are numerous vacant lots, which were once rare.

“This whole street used to be filled out with houses,” said Mike Sandell, owner of Pool-Rific Services. His workers were removing and storing pumps and heaters Monday from his clients’ pools so they wouldn’t get destroyed.

Home construction supplies like bricks, piping and even workers’ outhouses lined the streets, potential projectiles that could do further damage if a surge hits.

At the beach Monday afternoon, workers busily emptied the triple-wide trailer that houses The Goodz, a combined hardware, convenience, fishing supply, ice cream and beach goods store. Owner Graham Belger said he moved his “Your Island Everything Store” into the trailer after Ian destroyed his permanent building across the street.

“We’ll rebuild, but it is going to be bad,” he said.

Nearby, Don Girard and his son Dominic worked to batten down the family’s three-story combination rental and vacation home that’s about 30.5 meters from the water. It’s first-floor garage and entranceway were flooded by Helene last month, Hurricane Debby in August, and a tide brought by a recent supermoon.

Ian was by far the worst. Its waves crashed into the 14-year-old home’s second floor, destroying the flooring. Girard repaired the damage, and his aqua-blue and white home stands in contrast to the older, single-story house across the street. It was submerged by Ian, never repaired and remains vacant. Its once-off-white walls are now tinged with brown. Plywood covers the holes that once contained windows and doors.

Girard, who owns a banner and flag company in Texas, said that while his feelings about owning his home are mostly positive, they are becoming mixed. He said every December, his extended family gathers there for the holidays. At that time of year, temperatures in southwest Florida are usually in the low 20s Celsius with little rain or humidity. The area and its beaches fill with tourists.

“At Christmas, there is no better place in the world,” Girard said.

But flooding from Ian, the other storms and now Milton is leaving him frustrated.

“It’s been difficult, I’m not going to lie to you,” Girard said. “The last couple years have been pretty bad.”
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