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Carlos Ghosn’s great escape embarrasses Japanese government · Global Voices
Nevin Thompson

Disguised as a masked maintenance worker, Carlos Ghosn is released on bail in Tokyo on March 6, 2019. Screencap from Euronews official YouTube channel.
On December 31, 2019, Carlos Ghosn, disgraced former head of automakers Nissan and Renault, announced he had broken the conditions of his bail and had fled Japan for Lebanon. Details of his flight from Japan were slow to emerge over the year-end holiday period, and various theories of Ghosn's escape have included the help of a former Green Beret soldier, passing through border security in an oversize musical instrument case, and the covert help of the Japanese government itself, who wanted to be rid of the one-time Japanese corporate titan for once and for all.
In reality, Ghosn seems to have taken advantage of systemic shortcomings in Japan's police and prosecution services, the judicial system, passport security, ports control and more.
Ghosn had been released on bail and then confined to house arrest in March 2019 after being originally arrested in Japan in November 2018 on suspicion of fraud, tax evasion, violating securities laws and other allegations. At the time of his arrest in late 2018, Ghosn was chairperson of Japanese car company Nissan and its partner Renault, and had been accused of illegally diverting funds from Nissan for his personal use.
Since helping rescue Nissan from bankruptcy in 1999, Ghosn, a Brazilian-born French citizen with Lebanese ancestry had become one of Japan's most recognizable business personalities. Following his initial success with Nissan, Ghosn would eventually become chair of the world’s second-biggest carmaker, the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance, after setting up an infusion of cash to Nissan from French carmaker Renault, and then a partnership between the two companies. In 2016, Ghosn then helped Nissan take control of another struggling Japanese automaker, Mitsubishi, further establishing his influence in Japan's automotive industry.
Ghosn's arrest by Japanese prosecutors in November 2018 has shone an international spotlight on the perceived harshness of Japan's justice system. After being arrested, Ghosn was legally detained for 23 days without charges in a bare cell, and with no contact to the outside world. Following the end of the 23-day period, Ghosn continued to be detained in December 2018 without charge following additional allegations.
After finally being formally charged in court in January, Ghosn would then be denied release and would for several more months endure what some have called Japan's “hostage justice” for refusing to confess to charges brought against him by prosecutors.
#Ghosn was wearing a workman’s uniform, face mask, blue cap and glasses when he slipped out of the Tokyo Detention House and got into a minicar unrecognized by many of the journalists camped outside.
(@Reuters photos by Issei Kato @Hirame1972) https://t.co/IbKK9onfyl
— William Mallard (@BillyMallard) March 6, 2019
Ghosn was finally granted bail in Tokyo on March 6, 2019, and attempted to evade waiting reporters and paparazzi by disguising himself as a masked maintenance worker. He would be rearrested and released once more, with the new bail conditions restricting contact with his spouse, the fashion designer Carole Ghosn.
As Carlos Ghosn spent time under house arrest in Tokyo for the remainder of 2019 awaiting trial, his wife Carole campaigned on his behalf around the world, decrying Japan as a “fake democracy” because of its perceived lack of due process.
Citing an inability to get a fair trial and a supposed plot between the Japanese government and Nissan to “take him down“, Ghosn successfully made his escape from Japan to Lebanon on December 31, 2019.
When the news broke on New Year's Eve, the question for many was, how did Ghosn do it?
Ghosn was supposed to be under house arrest and constant surveillance at his Tokyo home as he awaited trial in Japan on charges of fraud, tax evasion, and securities violations. Ghosn's quick trip to Lebanon obviously meant he had escaped from Japan by plane.
An early theory, since disproven, was that a “Gregorian band” had entered Ghosn's Tokyo home to help celebrate a supposedly traditional Christian Lebanese New Year's Eve. According to the theory, Ghosn was then smuggled out of his home and then Japan in an oversize musical instrument case with a fifteen-person team that included a former American Green Beret special forces veteran.
ゲートを通過するゴーン氏
#今年作ったblender作品貼ってけ
#b3d pic.twitter.com/VrRmZXWSkv
— ○イジー (@daisycutter7) December 31, 2019
Carlos Ghosn passes through security (at the airport).
In fact, a combination of lax airport security, privileges enjoyed by the corporate and diplomatic elite, dysfunctional government relationships and rigid bureaucratic rules all made it relatively easy for Ghosn to skip bail and leave the country.
The first advantage Ghosn enjoyed when deciding to escape was that, under Japanese law, as a foreign visitor of Japan, Ghosn was required by immigration rules to always possess a passport. Ghosn possesses Brazilian, Lebanese and multiple French passports and was permitted to retain one of his French passports to conform with Japanese immigration rules (so far, France has denied Ghosn used a French passport, but Lebanon says he did to enter the country).
Retaining a passport made it easier for Ghosn to legally enter Lebanon, which has no extradition treaty with Japan.
If it turns out a key part of Ghosn's escape was him having one of his passports, I wonder whether he could have been issued some other form of ID to satisfy domestic law. pic.twitter.com/27hud7HFYQ
— Mulboyne (@Mulboyne) January 5, 2020
Ghosn was able to travel undetected by taxi and bullet train to Kansai International Airport, 430 kilometers from Tokyo (at one point during his escape he nearly encountered Japanese prime minister Abe Shinzo). His ease in evading house arrest highlighted Japan's relatively lackadaisical attitude towards monitoring Ghosn: security camera footage actually showed him departing for the airport, but the footage is only reviewed by Japanese courts once a month. The prosecution service, rather than local police, was responsible for enforcing Ghosn's arrest, and there seems to have been little coordination between different government agencies.
This disorganization among authorities made it easier for Ghosn to get through airport security. Ghosn apparently chose Kansai International Airport (KIX) because of a special terminal reserved for government and industry VIPs. Border control at the airport may have not been alerted about restrictions on Ghosn's travel. There is also the theory that Ghosn did indeed smuggle himself out in a large box of some kind that was allowed to bypass security at the VIP terminal at KIX after checking into a hotel near the airport.
It took the Japanese government a week to issue an official response. Initially, Japan's Justice Minister Mori Masako could neither confirm nor deny any details about Ghosn's escape. Mori would later announce that Ghosn's 9 million USD bail had been revoked, that the government had notified Interpol to request his arrest, and that immigration checks would be tightened. Japan has also issued an arrest warrant for Carole Ghosn for her alleged role in Ghosn's escape.
In the wake of Ghosn's escape, Japan commentators have argued that the country's exceedingly harsh treatment of Ghosn may have been reason enough for his flight. Other's have noted that what makes Ghosn's treatment so shocking is the privileges the business elite generally enjoy in other parts of the world when accused of breaking the law compared to regular folk.
David McNeill, the Economist's Japan correspondent, suggests it's possible to believe both things at the same time:
Is it so hard to accept that Carlos Ghosn is a grasping boss who muddied the boundaries between his personal finances and those of Nissan, and that his detention highlights epic flaws in Japan's criminal justice system? They're not mutually exclusive. https://t.co/J80Lh4ThWB
— David McNeill (@DavidMcNeill3) January 2, 2020
Ghosn is determined to have the last word. On January 8, the fugitive from Japanese justice held a press conference in Lebanon defending his innocence while criticizing Japan's justice system.

author: Nevin Thompson


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Deadline looms for biometric SIM card registration in Tanzania · Global Voices
Amanda Lichtenstein

Citizens in Tanzania have an extended deadline of January 20, 2020, to complete the biometric SIM card registration. Image of a fingerprint on a keyboard via Pixbay/Creative Commons.
Tanzanian citizens have until January 20, 2020, to register their SIM cards through the new biometric registration system launched by the Tanzanian Communication Regulatory Authority (TCRA) on May 1, 2019.
The biometric SIM card registration process means Tanzania joins a growing list of African nations gripped by the biometric data and digital identification revolution. The TCRA said biometric registration will help control cybercrime and fraudulent mobile phone abuse, among other reasons.
In previous years, Tanzanian citizens were required to show their telecom provider a voting card, drivers’ license or passport to register SIM cards, pre- and post-paid. But those without documentation could typically register using the documentation of friends or relatives, according to Samuel Kabulo, a Tanzanian citizen who lives in Dar es Salaam, and spoke with Global Voices via Whatsapp.
Now, in order to activate pre- and post-paid SIM cards, over 21.7 million mobile phone users in Tanzania must first register with the National Identification Authority (NIDA), which requires all citizens to provide fingerprints and proof of identity as part of the registration process.
To complete the biometric SIM card registration process, users must then go to a local service provider, show their NIDA card or number, get their thumbprint taken — and that information is then shared, vetted and confirmed through the NIDA system.
Those who do not register using the biometric system will be locked out of their SIM cards on January 20, and will not be able to make or receive phone calls or text messages. The new registration process also ensures that each user only registers one SIM card per network.
All eight networks in Tanzania have promised full cooperation with the TCRA, according to a representative from the Tanzanian Mobile Network Operators.
TCRA yapeleka kampeini ya Haachwi Mtu Nyuma kamilisha usajili wako mkoa Mtwara https://t.co/nipUM85NUn pic.twitter.com/8lCdpGlMUq
— SwahiliCloud (@SwahiliCloud) December 11, 2019
TCRA is bringing your campaign, “No One Left Behind, Complete Registration,” to the district of Mtwara.
This deadline is a 20-day extension from the original deadline of December 31, 2019, when it was reported that only 42 percent of SIM card owners had biometrically registered.
On Friday, December 27, 2019, President John Magufuli announced, “This kind of registration is important for national security and will help to address fraud incidents involving mobile phones,” according to The Citizen.
To drum up support for the biometric registration system, the TCRA identified 150 of Tanzania's top social media influencers to promote the campaign, “Haachwi Mtu Nyuma, Kamilisha Usajili” or “No One Will Be Left Behind, Complete Registration.”
The campaign includes regional outreach, concerts and mass sign-ups in Zanzibar, Shinyanga, Singida, Mtwara, Lindi and Ruvuma districts throughout Tanzania.
The influencers, who boast a combined base of 20 million followers, agreed to use their social media accounts to raise awareness about the importance of biometric registration. They also agreed to send a clear and direct message to citizens: register or face the lock-out consequences.
On Tanzania's independence day, December 9, influencers like Masoud Kipanya, with over 784,000 followers, aligned with Airtel network and posted an urgent message to sign up for the biometric registration:
Leo tunasherehekea Miaka 58 ya Uhuru,
Kuwa Huru kwa Peruzi na kuangali mambo mbalimbali mitandao kwa spidi ya Airtel 4G na bando za DABO DATA, Pia kamilisha usajili kwa Alama za Vidole, ni fasta na rahisi.#NdukiNduki #Airtel4G Cc; @airtel_tanzania pic.twitter.com/Ktfvfq4WPA
— Masoud Kipanya (@masoudkipanya) December 9, 2019
Today, we celebrate 58 years of independence. Feel free to peruse various networks with the speed of Airtel 4G and bundles with double data. Also, complete the biometric registration, it's fast and easy.
And this netizen joked that it's much better to wake up to a message from a lover than a threat from a telecom warning that they'll cut your line if you don't register:
Bora wewe ukiamka unakutana na SMS za mahaba kutoka kwa mpenzi wako…!
Mwenzio nakutana na SMS za vitisho kutoka voda wananiambia laini yangu itafungwa nisipo kamilisha usajili…! ??
— Saba Tano Mbili (@samwelreturn) December 5, 2019
Better if you wake up to encounter love SMS messages from your lover! Mates, I've encountered threatening SMS messages from VODA, they are telling me my line will be closed if I don't register the line!
To successfully register a SIM card biometrically, a citizen must first register with NIDA, the national identification authority, and receive either an actual identification card or at the very least, a registration number.
Citizens must submit their fingerprints and provide documents that show 1) proof of citizenship (birth certificate or affidavit, voter identification card), 2) proof of existence (driver's license or national health insurance card) and 3) proof of age (passport or primary school certificate).
In the countdown to the original December 31 deadline for biometric registration, long lines were reported at various NIDA offices throughout Tanzania as citizens attempted to clear the first hurdle of acquiring a NIDA identity number before completing their SIM card registrations with their network providers.
According to Kabulo in Dar es Salaam, acquiring the NIDA-issued identification card has been challenging for many citizens due to the birth certificate requirement.
“The big problem is the birth certificate which previously was of no importance to own it, and therefore, the majority of Tanzanians have no NIDA ID because it requires the applicant to bear a birth certificate or affidavit,” Kabulo told Global Voices through a Whatsapp message.
NIDA reported in April 2019 that it had registered approximately 88 percent of all eligible citizens and will provide “mass registration” drives for the remaining 12 percent of citizens over the age of 18 who are eligible but missed previous deadlines.
However, Minister for Home Affairs Kangi Lugola “told lawmakers that only between 13 million and 14 million Tanzanians out of a population of 55 million had national identification cards issued by … NIDA,” according to a November 2019 report by Xinhuanet.
Since the national identification exercise started in 2013, only a small percentage have received actual cards due to printing issues and other obstacles. Many more hold NIDA registration numbers, which should be sufficient to follow through with biometric registration of SIM cards, reassured TCRA authorities.
“Biometrics and digital ID are becoming firmly embedded in everyday life in many parts of Africa,” according to Biometrics Update, a website that tracks digital identification and biometrics systems around the world.
The site claims that the year 2019 saw the biggest leaps in biometric data collection and digital identification systems on the continent, from voter registration, healthcare access, SIM card registration and national identification schemes.
SIM card registration using biometric data raises serious concerns about privacy threats.
In June 2019, the government of Mozambique insisted that SIM card registration would “help it fight crime and fraud” and issued an ultimatum to citizens to register SIM cards. But privacy activists viewed the registration “as an infringement on users’ right to communicate privately,” especially during tense political periods such as elections.
Meanwhile, until November 2019, only 25 out of 54 African nations have national data protection laws.
Kenya's controversial “Huduma Namba” or “Service Number” system drew the most controversy in 2019 as it attempted to operate as a “single source of truth” that linked multiple digital identity systems. Civil society groups challenged the system in court, loudly questioning the constitutionality of the scheme as well as the potential for hacking and threats to citizens’ privacy and security.
On November 8, 2019, Kenya rolled out a brand new national data protection law, becoming the 26th nation with data protection measures in place, but critics say it may not be enough.
As the biometric SIM card registration deadline looms in Tanzania, citizens may face similar issues regarding data privacy and protection. While there are several laws that address the regulation of data and data privacy protections, there is no single comprehensive data protection law in Tanzania.
Editor's note: Thanks to Goodhope Amani for translation verification.

source: news-globalvoices

license: Creative Commons - Attribution - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

author: Amanda Lichtenstein


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The media habits of the Vietnamese minority in the Czech Republic: interview with Professor Tae-Sik Kim · Global Voices
Filip Noubel

Local grocery store run by Vietnamese owners in Prague. Typically, but not always, they keep a wide-open door even in the winter. Photo by Filip Noubel, used with permission.
With over 80,000 people, the Vietnamese are one of the largest ethnic minorities in the Czech Republic, where they amount to close to 1 percent of that country's population. Many belong to the second generation of the Vietnamese students and workers who moved to socialist Czechoslovakia in the 1970s within the Comecon migration accords.
Commercial and cultural relations between both countries extended to the present day, and many Vietnamese continue to migrate to the Czech Republic for study, business, and reuniting with family. This sizable community contributes to the shaping of a new culture that fuses elements of both countries.
I interviewed Professor Tae-Sik Kim after his presentation on Czech-Vietnamese media production and consumption at the Prague Media Point conference in Prague in December 2019. Kim is a South Korean scholar who studied in his country and the United States, and now teaches in the Czech Republic at Brno's Masaryk University. He focuses on diasporic media, Asian communities, and visual semiotics. The interview has been edited for brevity.
Filip Noubel (FN): Could you describe the media consumption habits of the first generation of the Czech-Vietnamese?
Tae-Sik Kim (TSK): The first generation of Vietnamese migrants to the Czech Republic relies heavily on Vietnamese satellite TV. If you visit Vietnamese restaurants, shops, or Prague's large-size wholesale Vietnamese market, SAPA, you will most likely hear the sound of Vietnamese language coming from a TV set, a tablet or a mobile phone. Many Vietnamese households also subscribe to Vietnamese satellite TV, now available from all major TV providers in the Czech Republic. I would say that Vietnamese satellite TV caters almost exclusively to the first generation, and those freshly arrived mainly because of language barriers and lifestyles, including their working conditions in shops and eateries. For this group, it has replaced older technologies such as VHR and VCD.
SAPA wholesale market in Prague which sells Vietnamese and Asian foods. Photo by Tae-Sik Kim, used with permission.
FN: How is the second generation different in that regard, and what is the role of social media in that part of the community?
TSK:  Not unlike people of their age group across the world, young, second-generation Czech-Vietnamese have fully adopted the internet in their daily media practices. While migrant children used to watch Vietnamese TV together with their parents mostly at meal times, their media practices have gotten more individualized as they use their private digital devices. A key criterion to classify social media in the Vietnamese community is language. While the first generation and recent migrants tend to rely on social networks based either in Vietnam or in their own diasporic community, such as the site Sangu.eu, migrant children who are fluent in both Czech and Vietnamese have formed diverse “transnational” social networks bridging Vietnam, the Czech Republic and their diasporic community. These include Facebook pages like the one by NGO Viet Up, which tends to organize community events for migrant children. Others act as representations of Vietnamese identity, those include Hội Thanh niên Sinh viên Việt Nam tại CH Séc. Finally some highlight transnational identities, for example the South East Asian Liaison page. While the Vietnamese community has failed to establish a conventional form of diasporic media, online media such as Vietinfo and Sangu have emerged to fill that gap. All those online platforms work as communication channels crossing national and community borders. As a result, social media have become the place for an ongoing negotiation of transnational lives.
FN: What is the role played by Korean media and pop culture for the younger generation of this community?
TSK: Korea media products have been popular in the past decades in South East Asia including Vietnam. Young Vietnamese in the Czech Republic have also been exposed to Korean media, given their technological availability and linguistic flexibility. Indeed, shared media practices often reflect the audiences’ common cultural identities and orientations. In this context, cultural similarity is not located between Vietnamese and Korean cultures, but rather in the commonality of a diasporic experiences and representations of an Asian culture in a non-Asian environment. Typically, the image of Asian children coming from sacrificial, hardworking migrant families is very different from the image of Czech children who are not expected to participate in the cultural sensibility of valuing family and work ethic. On the other hand, younger Czech-Vietnamese are also likely to differentiate themselves from the earlier generation of Vietnamese migrants. They identify themselves as people who are sensitive to cultural trends and have pronounced urban tastes. Taking advantage of their perceived higher human capital, they take a step closer to the cultural tastes of their contemporary Korean audiences.
FN: How are Vietnamese usually represented in Czech media?
TSK: Although I have learned that Vietnamese people are increasingly present in Czech media, I wouldn’t say that the stereotypical, negative representation of Vietnamese migrants in the Czech Republic has completely disappeared. However, my concern is more about the implied discourse about this population. Vietnamese migrants are often portrayed in Czech media as hardworking, successful economic migrants who raise competitive children. This approach has created a monotonous image of Vietnamese people, which is a very easy way to objectify a certain population. The truth is that Vietnamese people in the Czech Republic are no longer confined within their small shops.
Example of a trendy Vietnamese eatery in Prague whose name plays with the Czech word for soup (polévka) and the name of the traditional Vietnamese soup (phở). Photo by Tae-Sik Kim, used with permission.
FN: You call the Vietnamese community an “urban space mediator.” Could you explain this concept?
TSK: The Vietnamese have never formed ethnic enclaves in Czech urban areas. Although there are a couple of huge-sized wholesale complex exclusively owned by Vietnamese migrants in major cities like Prague and Brno, these places are quite different from the conventional ethnic enclaves in other global cities. They work as the backbone for Vietnamese retail businesses, rather than as centers of diasporic communities. The place where Czech people meet Vietnamese migrants on a daily basis are the small, local grocery businesses (called potraviny, meaning grocery, or večerka, meaning night shop) that have been almost entirely “monopolized” across the country by Vietnamese people. Since they are all located in local neighborhoods, these shops are quite common places for those who are relatively immobile and poor. Far from looking like global brand stores, local grocery shops often come to embody Vietnamese migrants as economic migrants who are not very westernized, urbanized, polished, or trendy. The irony is that such a (un)consciously ignored place tells much about the cultural position assigned by the majority to a migrant group. On the other hand, trendy-looking Vietnamese restaurants and cafes are  becoming increasingly visible in Czech urban centers and represent Vietnamese migrants in a radically different way. Coupled with the recent rapid economic growth and the tourism boom of the Czech Republic, these westernized, urbanized, polished, or trendy places are warmly welcomed. While it is still too early to generalize how Czech people perceive the Vietnamese diaspora, one can assume they have started to differentiate between different ways of being Vietnamese in the Czech Republic.

author: Filip Noubel


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Belize’s new fisheries bill: A ‘model for how to manage marine resources’ · Global Voices
Kori Tuitt

Drone shot of Caye Caulker, located in the world heritage Belize Barrier Reef. Photo by Falco Ermert on Flickr, CC BY 2.0.
Belize's latest commitment to ocean conservation is its new Fisheries Resources Bill, for which the country partnered with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), an international non-governmental organisation. The bill, which focuses on effective management solutions for overfishing, passed its first assessment by the country's House of Representatives in December 2019.
Among other things, the legislation will establish a new fisheries council to deal with stakeholder concerns and advise the government in fisheries management practices, including the establishment of “fishing priority areas,” where new ideas can be trialed and long-term fisheries production can be prioritised. It will also facilitate broader regional cooperation with neighbouring Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras in marine resource governance.
Global Voices interviewed Eric Schwaab, senior vice president for the EDF's oceans programme, to learn more about the partnership that championed the bill and what the new legislation hopes to accomplish.
Eric Schwaab, senior vice president for the EDF's oceans programme. Photo courtesy Mr. Schwaab, used with permission.
Global Voices (GV): Tell us about EDF's partnership with the Belizean government.
Eric Schwaab (ES): EDF has worked closely with the Belizean government for nearly a decade, in the development of the managed access programme and the adaptive management framework, which together emplaced rights-based fisheries management to supplement and then enhance the existing marine-protected area (MPA) networks. We helped fund positions within the Belizean Fisheries Department which made that work by external partners possible. We have continued to work closely with ministry and departmental officials — and a wide variety of stakeholders, including fishers, fishing cooperatives and fishing communities — in the development of the legislation, and then with government officials from other ministries to ensure both the integrity of the legislation, and that it answered concerns raised by them.
Most recently, we worked closely with Belizean security forces to ensure that the combination of the newly expanded network of managed access — including the improved fisheries management, compliance and enforcement provisions in the law, and the new, large MPA on the Honduran/Guatemalan border — helped them meet their needs. [We also worked] with National Assembly members with coastal constituencies in helping them understand that the fishing stakeholders were strongly in favour of this bill. That included meetings out in those communities. As EDF cannot do direct advocacy work, our team in country, led by Nic Requena, convened and helped educate the consortium of NGOs and other stakeholders that helped advocate the legislation.
EDF does not take funds from partner entities or institutions (where conflicts of interest might exist or be perceived), especially from the private sector, and very limited government funds — including none from Belize. Our funding for this work has come principally from non-for-profit philanthropies, including Summit Foundation and Flora Foundation, and from individual private donors who care about the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef ecosystem, the coral world, and the global ocean.
ES: The bill is expected to move through its second and third readings at the next meeting of the National Assembly in January. It will then be ready to be signed into law, beginning the process of translation into formal procedures that implement the law. There was no significant objection to the first reading, and we are hopeful that the law will be adopted shortly. Notably, this law will position Belize to join Japan and Cuba, with the third national reform globally within just over a year.
Cast net fishing at Port Honduras Marine Reserve, West Snake Caye, Belize. Photo by Ian Morton on Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
[There is] a wide range of concerns, from plastics pollution, coral declines and other aquatic habitat loss, to acidification and warming. Climate change impacts are a global threat to ocean resources. Yet, even as we work to control and reverse carbon emissions, addressing unsustainable fishing practices through effective fisheries management will yield significant, immediate benefits. This approach will both forestall and, in some cases, reverse effects to aquatic resources.
Climate change impacts include warming and acidification, rising seas that threaten key coastal habitats and coastal communities, and intensifying storms that will exacerbate those effects. In addition to these more commonly understood threats, we see fish populations moving poleward, increasing management conflict and threatening even stable management systems as fish cross jurisdictional boundaries. These effects will also acutely impact the developing tropics, where expected productivity declines occur in places where vulnerable people and high-diversity ecosystems are concentrated. So,we are focusing our work to ensure we are still producing impactful results by addressing shifting fish populations as climate impacts change our oceans.
Globally, about three billion people must have fish to fulfil their dietary requirements, and for more than a billion, important negative health consequences loom should management of fisheries fail. These vulnerabilities are concentrated among the world’s small-scale fishers and fishing communities, especially in the developing tropics [which are] most vulnerable to climate warming. In some cases, they may lose as much as 30-40 percent of their maximum fisheries production potential, even with good management.
Effective models for how to get fisheries management right in places where resources for management are scarce, and failure would harm both people and nature, are essential. This is especially true in the coral world, where overfishing and climate warming are combining to threaten virtually all of the world’s coral reef ecosystems. Belize can be a model for how to manage marine resources in ways that get the most from a changing world — and, just maybe, it will help slow down the ravages of climate by using fisheries management not just defensively, but as an active tool to improve hope for coral reef ecosystems and vulnerable coastal communities.
The bill establishes a firm foundation for doing what's required to make Belize a world leader in all of that.
Some of the coral life in the seas surrounding Belize. Photo by Suzanne Schroeter on Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.
We must do everything possible to reduce climate pollution. Dramatically reducing emissions globally is critical to protecting our oceans, and the ocean can be part of that process.
A recent report issued by the High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy listed five ways in which the ocean can be part of the climate solution.The report touches on the important role that healthy populations of large marine animals can play in sequestering carbon.
But even under the best mitigation scenarios, certain changes are already baked into our future, so adaptation to these changes is also critical. Ensuring that governments and communities are adopting climate-ready fisheries management approaches will be important for both environmental and food security reasons. This requires not only sound local fisheries management, but also greater emphasis on managing for shifting stocks and shifting ecosystems, with improved efforts to manage fisheries across jurisdictions. Additionally, equity concerns for some of our most vulnerable communities will become more prominent.
At EDF Oceans, we focus on changes at community, national and global scales. We are excited to see actions in Belize that benefit not only Belize and the Mesoamerican reef ecosystem, but also provide models for other communities and nations facing similar challenges and opportunities.
Through our work in Belize, we have supported good fisheries science and management, community-based action, and rights-based approaches that better invest those communities in long-term ocean conservation actions. Concurrently, through our fishery solution center, we help to bring people together across the world around common practices and toolkits that can help scale conservation globally.

author: Kori Tuitt


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Is Taiwan an unrecognized country? · Global Voices
Filip Noubel

Taipei's Liberty Square where an inflatable tank commemorating the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre was displayed in May 2019. Photo by Filip Noubel, used with permission.
The legal status of Taiwan is one of the most contested issues in international relations. In Taiwan itself, the majority of its 23 million inhabitants view their island as a sovereign state under the label of the Republic of China (ROC), while a fraction of the population calls for it to declare full independence. In China, the position of the government is that Taiwan is a province that is part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), even though it is not currently under its political or administrative control. Beijing strongly opposes any description of Taiwan as a sovereign or independent state. Citizens in mainland China hold a variety of views on Taiwan’s status, but at least publicly, tend to align with their government’s views. The issue is also strongly debated in the campaign leading to the January 2020 Presidential elections in Taiwan.
The origins of the existence of two separate entities, the ROC and the PRC, go back to two different political parties that were once allied, later fought a civil war, and ended up governing different territories.
The first one is the Kuomintang (KMT, in Chinese 中國國民黨 , or literally the Chinese National Party), a party that was established in 1911, as the last Chinese Qing dynasty collapsed and China became a republic. Its ideology is based on the Three Principles of the People, namely nationalism, democracy and the people’s livelihood. It is important to note that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) also adhered to those principles in its early history and that both parties were initially supported by the Soviet Union.
The second party is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP, in Chinese 中国共产党), founded in 1921. It bases its ideology on Communism, initially adopting the Soviet model, and later developing its own version. Until 1927, the CCP was generally in alliance and in support of the KMT.
After that date, both parties parted for a few years, mostly because of ideological differences, but decided to reunite in 1931 in a joint effort to combat the Japanese invasion of China. This period, known as the Second United Front, lasted until the early 1940s when once again competing ambitions brought back a lasting split.
Starting in 1946, both parties engaged in a full civil war which ended in 1949 when the CCP gained control over mainland China, while the KMT, together with two million soldiers and refugees, decided to flee to the island of Taiwan. From 1949 on, both parties have claimed to be the sole legal representative of China.
A ROC supporter decorating their car with the ROC flag in Taipei. Photo by Filip Noubel, used with permission.
As the world engaged in the Cold War, dividing continents and countries between governments supported by Moscow or by Washington and the West, Taiwan gained significant importance. The Korean War, followed by the Vietnam War made the island a strategic, military and political base to serve US interests in Asia. Washington thus provided economic aid, and pledged political and military support to the Republic of China in Taiwan, refusing to recognize the People’s Republic of China diplomatically. Those years were crucial for the KMT to gain absolute control over Taiwanese society, and gradually build a modern economy on the island.
Yet the emergence of China, politically as well as economically, could not be ignored indefinitely by the Western world. Hence, starting from the 1960s, a number of Western countries decided to end diplomatic relations with Taipei and switch to Beijing, as China maintains a ‘One China’ policy as a prerequisite for establishing diplomatic relations. The US established diplomatic relations with the PRC on January 1, 1979.
In practice though, around 50 countries maintain a representative office in Taiwan that covers most of the activities usually attributed to an embassy or a consulate. By the end of 2019, only 15 countries maintain full diplomatic relations with Taiwan.
The international community sometimes uses the term ‘Chinese Taipei’ to describe Taiwan. This label is mostly used during the Olympic Games, but also by organizations such as the World Trade Organization.
While today the international community is happy to maintain the current status-quo when dealing separately with Taiwan and China, certain political forces in both places are advocating for a change.
In Taiwan, there is a movement calling for abandoning the term of and references to the ‘Republic of China’ in order to replace it with the term of Taiwan, or the Republic of Taiwan. Two political parties are particularly vocal about this issue: the Formosa Alliance and the Taiwan Solidarity Union. This movement traces its origins to the Japanese colonial rule of Taiwan from 1895-1945 and has evolved since the 1990s into several political parties, civic movements, with claims for cultural and linguistic rights.
Most opposed to this political view is the KMT that embraces the identity of the Republic of China and believes in the reunification of Taiwan and China in the long term.
The DPP has a much more ambiguous position: as part of the Green-Coalition, it supports the notion of Taiwan being a sovereign state and not seeking reunification with the PRC. Yet whether Taiwan refers to ROC limited to the territory of Taiwan, or whether this position could evolve into the declaration of a Republic of Taiwan is an issue articulated differently at various times depending on the electoral calendar, and personal views of the DPP leaders and top officials.
For Beijing, any notion of an independent Taiwan is unacceptable. Beijing continues to state that reunification under the CCP is its official policy and strategy for the future, and does not rule out the use of military force. It believes that the ‘One Country, Two Systems’, currently applied to Hong-Kong and Macao, is the framework for reunification.
Meanwhile, Beijing is reinforcing its policy for the containment of Taiwan in diplomacy and other areas. It has successfully convinced a number of countries recognizing Taiwan to cut ties and switch to China. Besides this, it is successfully imposing its views in a number of economic activities, forcing foreign airlines, online retailers, cultural and academic actors to use the term ‘Taiwan, China’ when advertising services or announcing events in order to avoid facing possible retaliation, sanctions, or denial of access to the Chinese market.


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Is the Caribbean apocalypse-proof? · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

A little island in The Bahamas. Photo by John Hilliard on Flickr, CC BY 2.0.
In one of the most curious stories to be shared on social media platforms in the Caribbean at the start of 2020, the United Kingdom-based tabloid, The Sun, claimed that “scientists have worked out the safest places for you to be if a sudden global pandemic threatens to wipe out humanity.”
As it turns out, many of those supposed safe spots happen to be islands, with five out the top 20 located in the Caribbean. The highest-ranked of the regional nations was The Bahamas — ironically, still reeling from a disaster of its own in the form of Hurricane Dorian — followed by Trinidad and Tobago at Number 8 Barbados, Number 9, Cuba, Number 11, and Jamaica bringing up the rear at Number 18.
The article is careful to state, however, that apart from the top 3 (Australia, New Zealand and Iceland), other countries “ranked less than 0.5, so were less suitable for securing [humanity's] survival.” Sadly, Number 1-ranked Australia has been battling debilitating wildfires since June 2019, so even if the continent were inclined to offer itself as an end-of-days refuge — questionable given its record on migration — it currently has its hands full (and indeed, requires both international sympathy and aid).
Some of the features that contributed to the final scores included things like “a good physical location, natural resources and political harmony.”
Caribbean netizens were, for the most part, amused by the study, in which countries were ranked based on “the ability to avoid contagion from other areas.” The “no man is an island” philosophy clearly carries no weight when it comes to the apocalypse — if doomsday looms, apparently, an island is exactly where you want to be. The infographic accompanying the article did not help to instill confidence in the findings, however, what with Cape Verde appearing slightly north of where it is actually located and Madagascar showing up twice — once off the coast of Brazil.
The research, first published in the international journal Risk Analysis, was conducted by Matt Boyd and Nick Wilson.
Wilson, a public health physician at the University of Otago in New Zealand, suggested that biotechnology discoveries could potentially result in a genetically-engineered pandemic threatening human survival. “Though carriers of disease can easily circumvent land borders,” he told The Sun, “a closed self-sufficient island could harbour an isolated, technologically-adept population that could repopulate the earth following a disaster.”
The study only ranked United Nations-recognised sovereign states with populations greater than 250,000 because, according to Wilson, while smaller islands may well survive without assistance post-apocalypse, the researchers felt that “a diverse range of technical experts would be needed on an island in order to rebuild humanity.”
As such, countries with high gross domestic product figures, strong food sustainability and solid energy production performed best, though the researchers admit “their methodology probably isn't perfect.” They did not consider, for instance, the effects of the climate crisis, in which island nations are at the highest risk.
For many regional netizens, the results of the study only served to strengthen their determination that they live in one of the best places on Earth, and they have no intention of leaving, despite near-apocalyptic per-capita levels of corruption and crime. Some found the findings to be quite sensible, in fact, suggesting that countries able to supply their own food and energy needs would likely be ranked in the top 5 locations able to withstand such an eventuality.
Others found it hilariously ironic that the Global North might one day be desperately clambering to reach the Global South in order to survive some sort of viral, bacterial or fungal apocalypse, saying, “Nope, nope, nope. We need to protect our shitholes.”

author: Janine Mendes-Franco


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Philippine art town unites against mining extension · Global Voices
Kodao Productions

The candle-lighting activity opposing the extension of mining operations in Angono. (Photo courtesy of the Angono Public Information Office)
This article by Raymund B. Villanueva is from Kodao, an independent news site in the Philippines, and is republished on Global Voices as part of a content-sharing agreement.
The people and the local government of the Philippine town of Angono in Rizal Province are petitioning the national government to prevent the extension of mining operations in their area, citing grave damages to their environment after five decades of gravel extraction.
Members of the group UMALMA, the Ugnayan ng Mamamayang Ayaw na at Laban sa Minahan sa Angono [People's Unity Against Mining in Angono], said they support the local government of Angono in its “Yes to Rehabilitation [and] No to Quarry Extension” position.
The group said Angono no longer needs the mining companies’ annual fee of P33 million (652,000 US dollars) if it means exposing their town to dangers brought about by climate change and global warming.
The group warned about the impact of the predicted big earthquake that may hit Metropolitan Manila in the future:
It is a fact that Angono also lies merely 15 kilometers from the Manggahan Floodway and the Marikina Fault Line should ‘The Big One’ happen.
Famous for its annual Higantes Parade Festival featuring colorful paper mache giants, Angono is also considered as the country’s foremost artists’ hub having produced at least two national and other well-known artists.
On 3 January 2020, groups gathered in front of the town’s municipal hall to hold a candle-lighting event and sign a manifesto against the continuation of mining operations by LaFarge Holcim Holdings and its associates Delta Earthmoving Inc., Batong Angono Aggregates Corp. (BAAC), and the Concrete Aggregates Corporation (CAC) of the Ortigas Group.
Gravel mining in Angono started in 1969 covering 212 hectares of the hills overlooking the scenic Laguna de Bai lakeside town, UMALMA said.
The two current Mineral Production and Sharing Agreements (MPSA), extended by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in 1995 and 1996 are due to expire this year and 2021.
UMALMA said that the companies applied for a seven-year quarry extension in 2017 that only became public knowledge when they asked company lawyers in a public hearing last January 2018.
The quarries shall have until 2029 to operate should the DENR grant their application.
UMALMA, however, pointed out that the Mines and Geosciences Bureau of the DENR has the discretion to approve extensions of up to 25 years in accordance with the Mining Act of 1995.
The group revealed that the companies’ original petition for extension was actually for this period, possibly granting continued operations until 2046. It added:
If the extension petition is approved, the companies will extract the remaining 57,940,264 million metric tons of gravel from the hills of Angono.
UMALMA said the nearly 58 million metric tons is all that remains of the 482. 8 million metric tons lodged in the mountain system that hosts the historically and artistically important Angono Petroglyphs.
The 10-year extension would exhaust the remaining 58 million metric tons at the current annual extraction rate of 4,100,000 metric tons by the companies, UMALMA said.
It is clear that the mining companies have over-extracted from their stated 4.1 million metric ton target for 2018 by mining 4.6 million metric tons as published in its own ‘Sulong Angono’ newsletter.
Gravel extraction in Angono. (Photo courtesy of the Angono Public Information Office)
LaFarge Holcim for its part said it is practicing “responsible mining” and undergoing “progressive rehabilitation” of areas affected by its operations through tree planting.
Its Angono operations also use a Zero Discharge System water treatment in its settling pond that prevents wastewater from being discharged from nearby water systems such as Laguna de Bai.
In its website, LaFarge Holcim said it is a world leader in implementing international standards and sustainability in mining.
Sustainability is among our core values at Holcim Philippines. We believe it is a key driver of our business success and we strive to practice this every day in our operations.
This outlook may be seen in the company’s efforts to be respectful of the environment, ensure the health and safety of our people and partners and help uplift its host communities, it claims.
LaFarge Holcim said it also assumed the community development responsibilities of its partner CAC when its subsidiary BAAC took over the former’s Angono mining operations in June 2008 through its “LaFarge Way of doing things.”
BAAC`s implementation of its Social Development and Management Program (SDMP) has made the company quite a household name in terms of community development support not only in their two main host Barangays but also in the whole town of Angono, a DENR-MGB Region IV-A article said.
The article, written by one Sonny Villar, added the LaFarge Holcim subsidiary had been a recipient of a Titanium Achievement award for quarry operation in the 2009 Presidential Mineral Industry Environmental Awards.
UMALMA, however, revealed that while LaFarge Holcim has petitioned for an extension of its mining operations, it has also submitted its Final Mine Rehabilitation and/or Decommissioning Program approved by the DENR-MGB last 11 July 2018.
The FMRDP is a 10-year phase-out of mining operations in Angono that has a budget of P23 million (453,000 US dollars), the group said.
Part of the phase-out and decommissioning involves the removal of mining machinery and equipment; formation of a monitoring team composed of barangay [village], environment organizations, the local government unit and the DENR; revegetation, air monitoring, noise and fugitive dust elimination; safety; and separation pay and benefits to 136 permanent employees and about 500 contractual employees.
Part of the rehabilitation program is to transform the mined-out areas into a theme park or a residential and commercial area, UMALMA said.
But the group said the entire town has spoken and it wants the immediate implementation of the rehabilitation plan once current mining permits have run their course.
It is the position of the local government, led by Mayor Jeri Mae and Vice-Mayor Gerry Calderon as well as the Town Council, ‘Yes to Rehabilitation at No to Quarry Extension’.
It added that the local government is after environmental and health reasons as well as its legacy to young Angono residents.
In their candle-lighting event last Friday, Vice Mayor Gerry Calderon said the Town Council supports Mayor Jeri Mae Calderon’s position not to extend mining operations in Angono.
“It is important to show that the people of Angono is united behind our call,” he said.
Mayor Jeri Mae for her part said she is heartened to witness that her town’s people are behind the call to save what remains of Angono’s hills.
The town’s petition, addressed to the DENR and President Rodrigo Duterte has been posted on social media, reaching more than 107,000 views in three days.
The people of Angono are one with our local officials in opposing the application for renewal operation of a mining company in Angono, Rizal Province, the Republic of the Philippines which has been operating for the past 50 years.
Petition signing in Angono. Photo from Angono Public Information Office

author: Kodao Productions


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Guatemalan indigenous journalist charged with terrorism released from prison · Global Voices
Melissa Vida

Court of Major Risk “B” released Francisco Lucas Pedro who was detained since December 21, 2019. Photo by Nanci Sinto. Used with permission.
A court in Guatemala City released indigenous journalist and activist Francisco Lucas Pedro on January 3 after he spent 13 days in detention since his arrest in the northeastern department of Huehuetenango. According to the police, he is accused of terrorism and arson, but human rights groups say the arrest was illegal.
Back in 2012, a criminal court had issued an arrest warrant against Lucas based on a complaint made by World Bank-funded Ecoener Hidralia Energía. This is the Spanish firm behind Hidro Santa Cruz, the company that wanted to build a controversial water dam on the Q'am B'alam river, considered sacred by the Q'anjob'al people.
Lucas was an active participant in the civic movement against the dam, whose construction the company eventually canceled following eight years of protests, court battles, and international pressure. Ecoener Hidralia Energía left Guatemala in 2016.
Prensa Comunitaria, along with Nobel-prize winner Mayan activist Rigoberta Menchu, the Office of the UN Commissioner for Human Rights in Guatemala (OACNUDH Guatemala), and the Office of the Human Rights in Guatemala, led a campaign for Lucas’ release.
When he was freed, Lucas told reporters that the arrest affected his physical and mental health.
Hoy, tres de enero, me encuentro aquí, el juez me ha dictado “falta de mérito”, pero también quiero hacer saber al público que me ha afectado la vida, me ha afectado en partes físicos de esta tortura que le hace pasar a uno y también quiero hacer claro, quiero hacer ver al mundo que soy inocente.
Today, on January 3, the judge has ruled my case as lacking evidence [against me], but I also want to let the public know that it has affected my life, it has affected me physically because of the torture that they make you go through and I also want to make it clear, I want to make the world see that I am innocent.
Police say Lucas was charged with “coercion, threats, arson, activity against the security of the nation, terrorism, kidnapping, illegal detentions, and attack against the security of public services.” These charges against him had been allegedly dropped in 2016 for reasons that could not be verified by Global Voices.
In total, 21 land defenders had been charged in the Hidro Santa Cruz case. Two of these people, Saúl Méndez and Rogelio Velásquez, were sentenced to 33 years in prison for conspiring to commit murder in 2014. They were released in 2016 after winning an appeal. In this case, the appeals judges wrote that “we cannot allow for, nor support a negligent, ineffective and inefficient investigation, one that is based on unsubstantiated evidence…[The Public Prosecutor] was unable to obtain any kind of evidence that attributed the actions to the accused,” according to excerpts reported by Centro de Medios Independientes de Guatemala (CMI Guatemala).
Better known by his Mayan name, Palas Luin, Lucas is a member of the Winaq indigenous political movement, is an expert accountant and works for the local outlet Prensa Comunitaria. At the time of the arrest, he was reporting on the trial of two Hidro Santa Cruz plant workers who are accused of murdering a local community member and injuring two others in 2012, according to Prensa Comunitaria.
Court of Major Risk “B” released Francisco Lucas Pedro who was detained since December 21, 2019. Photo by Nanci Sinto. Used with permission.
The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Michel Forst, believes Lucas was another victim in a string of recent judicial cases against environmental defenders in the Central American country.
Between 2017 and 2019, 106 human rights leaders, and in particular indigenous people, were unjustly detained, according to OACNUDH and the Guatemalan Office of Human Rights. According to these institutions, the victims are “criminalized”, which means that “criminal law is misused” against them, as mentioned in their December 2019 report.
According to Global Witness, “Guatemala was the deadliest nation for land defenders per head of population with 16 confirmed killings” in 2018, as reported by France24. Guatemala saw a sharp rise in attacks against land defenders that year, too.
OACNUDH and the Office for Human Rights also mention in the report that the “attacks against defenders have negative impacts at various levels, including the individual, family and collective/community spheres (especially in the case of indigenous peoples), and generate, as a result, silencing and paralyzing effects in their work.”
Guatemalan society is polarized on issues such as those. When OACNUDH tweeted its support to Lucas, people replied skeptically to his innocence.
For example, Twitter users Hugo Castañeda and Luisa Ferreiro replied, respectively, that “any crime is allowed if you call yourself a human rights defender…” and “it's amazing how they support the guerrillas, how disgusting.”
Others, using the hashtag “#ChicoLibre”, showed support for Lucas. Victorino Tejaxún, for example, tweeted his belief that Mr. Lucas was unjustly criminalized.
¡Francisco Lucas Libre!
El malicioso uso del derecho penal para criminalizado a defensores de derechos humanos queda evidenciado nuevamente.#ChicoLibre https://t.co/afvp3GRX8T
— Victorino Tejaxún (@VTejaxun) January 3, 2020
Francisco Lucas Libre! The malicious use of criminal law to criminalize human rights defenders is once again evident. #ChicoLibre
Indigenous Kaqchikel singer Sara Curruchich also tweeted her support.
? Sumo mi voz para denunciar la criminalización de Francisco Lucas, defensor del Pueblo Maya Q'anjob'al. Se suma a la larga lista de personas defensoras de derechos humanos criminalizadas en Guatemala. ¡ Lxs defensorxs no son criminales ! #ChicoLibre pic.twitter.com/jatsSB86kc
— Sara (@SaraCurruchich) December 28, 2019
I add my voice to denounce the criminalization of Francisco Lucas, defender of the Q'anjob'al Mayan People. He joins the long list of human rights defenders who have been criminalized in Guatemala. #ChicoLibre
For Nansi Rodriguez, a contributor covering Guatemala for the weekly newsletter Central American News, the arrest was devastating. Every week, she relies on Prensa Comunitaria –which describes itself as doing “community, feminist and autonomous journalism” – as a valuable and irreplaceable source of news.
“It is heartbreaking because Prensa Comunitaria is the main news source providing information on all these environmental issues and attacks on pueblos that none of the main news sites tackle,” Ms. Rodriguez told Global Voices. “Prensa Comunitaria provides hope for people to stay informed and that marginalized communities have a voice.”
Prensa Libre, one of the largest newspapers in Guatemala, did not report on the arrest.

author: Melissa Vida


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Interfaith harmony disturbed after Sikh holy site attacked in Pakistan · Global Voices
R Umaima Ahmed

Gurdwara Janam Asthan (also known as Gurdwara Nankana Sahib), is a highly revered gurdwara located in the city of Nankana Sahib near Lahore Pakistan. It was built at the site where the founder of Sikhism, Guru Nanak, was believed to be born. Image from Flickr by Hemanshu Kumar. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Last week the #NankanaSahib hashtag was trending on social media in Pakistan after a large number of protesters surrounded the Gurdwara Janam Ashtam at Nankana Sahib and threatened to ransack the Sikh holy site. The mob used hateful slogans against the Sikh minority community and pelted stones at the Gurdwara.
In a statement issued by the Pakistani Foreign Office on 3 January 2020, officials blamed the incident on an “altercation between two Muslim groups”. Reports said customers at Zaman's tea stall in front of Gurdwara Janam Asthan were in an altercation which resulted in the arrest of the tea stall owner and some members of his family who were also involved.
Although the altercation was unrelated, the owner's nephew, Muhammad Hassan, made news recently for allegedly forcing a Sikh girl to convert to Islam in order to marry her.
On learning of the arrest of his uncle, Hassan’s brother Imran Chishti assumed that they were at the behest of the Sikh Community. In response, Chishti gathered a group of people who attacked the Gurdwara.
Videos circulating on social media showed the mob hurling abuse. Imran Chishti was seen threatening the Sikh community saying that Nankana Sahib’s name should be changed to ‘Ghulaman-e-Mustafa’ (meaning slave of Mustafa, the Prophet Muhammad’s other name) and all Gurdwaras would be converted to Mosques.
The incident was condemned on social media with demands that the government intervene immediately to resolve the issue. Shiraz Hassan, a journalist, shared the video and asked where government was:
People from #Sikh community are stuck inside the Gurdwara and many are in their homes fearing mob attacks #NankanaSahib – where is the writ of the government???? https://t.co/m5D91sAjZG
— Shiraz Hassan (@ShirazHassan) January 3, 2020
In a Tweet. the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan also criticised the incident:
HRCP is alarmed by the situation that has emerged today in #NankanaSahib where a mob gathered outside the Gurdwara.
— Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (@HRCP87) January 3, 2020
Imran Chishti later apologized for instigating people, however, he was arrested by the police who registered a criminal case against him.
Imran who uttered objectionable words against Sikhs yesterday apologises today for his misconduct . pic.twitter.com/cTmThmvSgR
— Kh khalid Farooq (@Kkf50) January 4, 2020
Translation: I apologize for all that happened in Nankana Sahib, this was not the intent. In the height of emotions, I said things which should not have been said. I would like to apologize to the Sikh community for my actions. We have been living as brothers for ages and will always respect them and their place of worship.
#ImranChishti at insdad-e-deshshat gardi adalat (terrorism court) today, in 7 day jismani (physical) remand. State filed FIR # 6/2020 u/s 295A/290/291/341/506/148/149, 6 sound system/7ATA (non bailable section under Anti Terrorism Act). Most likely 2-5 yr sentence. #NankanaSahib https://t.co/M3FXiZ1qNt pic.twitter.com/tnCzqoYqT0
— Harinder Singh | ਹਰਿੰਦਰ ਸਿੰਘ (@1Force) January 6, 2020
Harmeet Singh of the Young Singh Sewa Society Sri Nankana Sahib spoke to Global Voices about his experience inside the Gurdwara as it was being attacked:
I was inside the Gurdwara when the incident happened. We were preparing for the evening prayer for Guru Gobind Singh. A large crowd gathered outside chanting slogans [it] was very disturbing as something like this had never happened before. We were scared that they would damage the Gurdwara but the police (arrived and) handled the matter amicably.
Federal Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari has not issued a statement on the incident, however, the Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan tweeted:
The major difference between the condemnable Nankana incident & the ongoing attacks across India on Muslims & other minorities is this: the former is against my vision & will find zero tolerance & protection from the govt incl police & judiciary;
— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) January 5, 2020
Many netizens celebrated after the culprits were arrested.
No one will be allowed to spread Hate in the name of religion; No one will be above law in #Pakistan ??
The main culprit of #NankanaSahib incident is ARRESTED!!
This is #NayaPakistan led by #PMIK ; Rights of minorities will be protected on every cost. IA pic.twitter.com/smCAIy2fmK
— Adnan Zaheer Khawaja (@Adnan_Zaheer) January 5, 2020
Excellent. That's how a civilised society works. #NankanaSahib
Meanwhile future ministers are beating up students in #JNUViolence in India. https://t.co/H4Vq0HFZo0
— علي (@OpusOfAli) January 5, 2020
Interior Minister Brigadier Ijaz Ahmed Shah (Retired) visited the Nankana Sahab and assured the Sikh community that the culprits would be brought to justice.
Interior Minister visits #NankanaSahib,meets sikhs & all stakeholders.Orders charging the culprits with #blasphemy and hate-speech sections to strictly penalise elements who tried to incite communal feelings outside Gurduwara.Sikh-Muslim friendship wl be protected at all levels✌? pic.twitter.com/1o3z3j5gUX
— Rᴀғɪǫᴜᴇ Kʜᴏᴋʜᴀʀ ★ (@RafiqueAhmedK19) January 5, 2020
The Pakistan’s Foreign Office further said, the Gurdwara remains untouched and undamaged. All insinuations to the contrary, particularly the claims of acts of ‘desecration and destruction’ […] of the holy place, are not only false but also mischievous.”
This is not the first time a religious site or minorities in Pakistan have been attacked. A number of cases related to forced conversion of Hindu and Christian girls, or of Muslim men forcefully converting non-Muslim girls to Islam and then marrying them have been registered by the police.

author: R Umaima Ahmed


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Sudan needs strong network neutrality laws to match its growing internet boom · Global Voices
Mohamed Suliman

A woman searches her smartphone. Photo via Piqsels, CC0 1.0 Universal.
In Sudan, where the internet plays a crucial role in its political and economic transformation, net neutrality legislation still has a long way to go.
Net neutrality is the principle that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should treat all internet traffic equally, and not discriminate and charge differently based on users, content and applications.
In the broadest terms, it is about ensuring free and fair access to the internet through laws and policies that mitigate tensions between the private sector and the public good.
While there is no unified definition of the term, “most [proponents] agree … that owners of the networks that compose and provide access to the internet should not control how consumers lawfully use that network, and they should not be able to discriminate against content provider access to that network,” according to a paper by Angele A. Gilroy, an academic.
Law professor Tim Wu first coined the term in 2003 in his paper, “Network Neutrality, Broadband Discrimination,” in which he describes various tensions between the private sector and public interest groups.
As internet access becomes more accessible to a wider range of Sudanese citizens, a lack of net neutrality regulations means that violations in Sudan occur easily and often.
Violations of net neutrality come in many forms, such as “discrimination by protocol” when telecom companies and ISPs restrict or block access to certain sites or services by discriminating against certain communication protocols — for example, when ISPs block access to Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications like WhatsApp, Skype and Viber.
In other cases, ISPs favor certain websites or applications by offering zero-rating plans that allow users to access them without counting it against their data caps or charging them for that access. This discriminatory pricing bias gives some companies an unfair advantage over their competitors.
In Sudan, the main players in the telecoms market have been practicing zero-rating — a clear violation of the basic principles of net neutrality set by experts in the field that have since become accepted community norms.
MTN Sudan, a subsidiary of the South-African based MTN group, provides its users with access to Facebook Zero. This service, which is part of an international project launched by Facebook in collaboration with mobile network providers, offers a stripped, text-only version of Facebook for free.
Another example was the Wikipedia Zero project offered by the telecom company Sudani, as part of the Wikipedia-zero program. It offered access to the online encyclopedia free of charge through mobile phones. The Wikipedia Zero program, which was slammed by advocates for violating net neutrality, was discontinued in 2018.
Zain Sudan, a subsidiary of the Kuwaiti Zain group, has been providing its users with access to Facebook’s Free Basics program, an app that gives users access to a handful of web-based services, the most recognizable and prominent of which is Facebook, according to this list. 2017 research by Global Voices found that Free Basics violated net neutrality and also granted Facebook access to unique streams of data about the habits and interests of users in developing countries.
Yet, Zain Sudan has recently promoted another offer called Flex that gives its users free access to Facebook and its messaging app, Messenger.
Telephone booths in Sabaloka, Sudan, February 16, 2004. Photo by Arne Hoel/World Bank via Flickr, 2004 by CC.BY.20.
Sudan does not yet have a law dedicated to net neutrality. However, a few legal provisions in the 2018 Telecommunications and Postal Regulation Act indirectly address and tackle the issue.
Article 25 of the act prohibits any non-competitive activities by licensed companies. Moreover, in what could be interpreted as an anti-zero-rating stance, Article 38 of the act criminalizes setting prices that discriminate between the users and also discounts that limit and restrict competition.
Another law that partially tackles the issue of network neutrality is the Organizing Competitiveness and Preventing monopoly Law of 2009. Chapter two of this law prohibits giving any entity the privilege to distribute services or products based on market segmentation on a geographic basis, a specific time period or to favor certain customers over others.
In a country where the internet fueled a revolution and now drives the emergence of youth tech startups, leveling the playing field through net neutrality legislation is crucial. This will help regulate economic competitors and also protect users’ rights to free and fair access to all services and apps.
Sudan could learn from countries like the Canada, India, and The Netherlands which have already set legal measures and laws to regulate telecom and ISP practices with respect to net neutrality.
Additionally, Sudan must strive for a cultural shift within civil society and the private sector to raise awareness and build incentives for defending net neutrality.

author: Mohamed Suliman


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The impact of Hong Kong protests on Taiwan’s presidential election and cross-strait relations · Global Voices
Chinese Border-crossing Question and Answer

Taiwan international solidarity rally in support of Hong Kong anti-China extradition protests on June 16. Photo taken by Benson Tsang. Used with permission.
The project Chinese Cross-Border Question and Answer, sponsored by the Hong Kong NGO Culture and Media Education Foundation, reports on common concerns from Chinese communities in mainland China and abroad. The following post was originally written in Chinese and published on various websites, including inmediahk.net and matters.news. The English version is published by Global Voices under a partnership agreement.
Taiwan is holding presidential elections on January 11, 2020 to determine the course of its political and economic orientation for the next four years. The contenders are current President Tsai Ing-wen, Kuomintang candidate Han Kuo-yu and minority party leader James Soong.
Various polls in December 2019 indicated that Tsai of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) would win a landslide victory.
Many have pointed out that Hong Kong’s protests have contributed to Tsai’s popularity as the Hong Kong crisis was triggered by Beijing’s tightened control over its political and legal system. Besides, Tsai’s pro-Taiwan independence stand can serve as a protection against Beijing political influence in Taiwan. The Cross-Border Q&A team has interviewed a number of veteran journalists and news observers to explain exactly how the Hong Kong protests have affected Taiwan’s political development. They include Prof Kuan Chung-hsiang, a media scholar from National Chung Cheng University, Portnoy Cheng, founder of the PanSci news platform, and former editor of Chinese Global Voices, and Albert Tzeng former editor of Initium media,  and city councilor of the New Taipei district government.
Kuan Chung-hsiang. Screenshot from TED.
Kuan Chung-hsiang:  The Hong Kong protests have a very significant impact. The popularity of the two major candidates Tsai Ing-wen and Han Kuo-yu was at a comparable level before July 2019, but after that, Tsai’s popularity surged and the gap between the two has since widened. I believe this has something to do with the anti-extradition protests in Hong Kong.
The Yuen Long subway attack incident on July 21 was widely reported in Taiwan. Taiwanese people were shocked to see how the Hong Kong police were cooperating with the triads [crime groups who are associated with Beijing]. Han, who is pro-China, had visited the China Liaison Office in Hong Kong back in March 2019. For those who have been critical of the “China factor” that interferes with elections in Taiwan, this caused even more anxiety. Some even feel that if Han wins the election, the autonomy of Taiwan would come to an end. Such “end of a statehood” sentiment is favorable to the pan-Green coalition which supports Taiwan’s political autonomy.
Of course, apart from the Hong Kong and China factors, Han’s image, his empty promise made during the Kaohsiung city mayor election, his decision to run for presidential election soon after he took up the mayoral position, and his shifting political stands have all contributed to the decline of his popularity.
Portnoy Cheng. Photo from Panschool.asia.
Portnoy Cheng: Hong Kong is a testing ground for the “One Country Two Systems”. After the city unified with China in 1997, its economy continued growing given that its administration is reputed for its effectiveness and no tolerance for corruption. This made it very attractive to Taiwanese who feel themselves isolated and trapped in their island. That’s why when Hong Kong people stood out to resist China’s political encroachment, they were shocked. In the past, Taiwanese people paid little attention to Hong Kong. Even during the Umbrella Protests in 2014, a majority of the Taiwanese were not aware of those developments. However, in the context of the anti-extradition protests, the Hong Kong government has used the case of a murder committed in Taiwan involving Hong Kong citizens as the excuse for the legislation. The case inspired Taiwanese politicians to comment on the incident, which later turned into a dominant election campaign topic in Taiwan.
More and more Taiwanese have come to see that Han Kuo-yu and the KMT’s vision for the future development of Taiwan is to embrace and learn from China. The struggle in Hong Kong has told us that this path is not a way out. Such realisation has definitely affected the popularity of the two candidates. However, the effect of a single political incident can hardly have a long-lasting effect. In Taiwan, middle-aged and older voters are very conservative, and see economic and social stability as the most crucial value. Hence they cannot understand the protests in Hong Kong. Moreover, many politicians and opinion leaders in Taiwan have been confirming the Chinese government’s view that the Hong Kong protests are under influence of foreign forces, thus they support of Hong Kong police’s hard-handed crackdown. So we can’t over-estimate the impact of Hong Kong’s factor on the elections.
Albert Tzeng. Screenshot from TED.
Albert Tzeng: The one million people’s rally against the legislation of extradition law on June 8 2019 has shaken Taiwan. As the President of Republic of China (ROC), Tsai Ing-wen expressed her support for the Hong Kong protesters. Two days later, the DPP conducted a popularity poll to decide on the party’s presidential candidate, and Tsai won over her competitor William Lai Ching-te and was thus set to run for her re-election.
Since July, confrontations between Hong Kong protesters and the police have turned violent and the situation has kept escalating as the result of such incidents as the Yuen Long subway attack, the rubber bullet hit a woman’s eye case, police firing live rounds. All these news have shaken Taiwan: under the so-called “One Country Two Systems”, democracy, freedom and human rights are being suppressed by the Chinese Communist Party, the de facto ruler of Hong Kong. In the past few months, the gap in popularity polls between Tsai and Han has become wider and wider.
Hong Kong’s protests have affected Taiwan political dynamics in four major aspects:
Firstly, in 2018 the axis of Taiwan’s political dynamics evolved around “economy and administration”. People then expressed their discontents with Tsai’s hasty social policy reform with their votes in local elections. However, in January 2019, after Tsai rebuked Chinese President Xi Jinping's new year speech on Taiwan, the public shifted their attention to the “China factor” and “cross-strait relations”. Since March 2019, as the anti-extradition protests in Hong Kong started, the political dynamics surrounding the “China factor” consolidated in a way that is favorable to the pan-Green coalition [parties supporting the DPP].
Secondly, Hong Kong’s protests have resonated in the context of intensified U.S-China diplomatic relations and trade war. The passing of Hong Kong HUman Rights and Democracy Act in the U.S. uplifted the protesters. Hong Kong has thus become a bargaining chip in the U.S-China negotiation. This situation has brought back the memories during the Cold War against communist regimes.
Thirdly, Hong Kong’s unrest has set a stage for President Tsai Ing-wen to perform her leadership. The Hong Kong protests have kept Taiwanese people restless, as they prefer the status quo more than ever. Such desire has sidelined Tsai’s competitor within DPP, William Lai, who is more supportive of Taiwan's independence. It is also a big blow for Han Kuo-yu, who had visited China's Liaison Office in March 2019 to reinforce his pro-Beijing image.
Fourthly, the pro-China blue camp [parties supporting the KMT] has changed its political stand thanks to Hong Kong protests. After one million people rallied in Hong Kong in June 2019, former KMT Chair and former new Taipei city mayor Eric Chu Li-luan expressed his support for Hong Kong protesters on Facebook, saying that “One Country and Two Systems is never an option for Taiwan”. Later on, Terry Kuo, Han Kuo-yu and other KMT members followed Chu’s political line. In October 2019, the “New Republic”a group, made of younger KMT members even put on the party's agenda a revision of the China policy of the pan-blue coalition.


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Will 2020 be the year of the Nigerian girl and woman?  · Global Voices
Adetomiwa Isiaka

Aisha Mohammed, 17, thinks education is playing a vital role in rebuilding her self-confidence and hope for the future in northeastern Nigeria. Photo by Erick Gibson, Creative Associates International/USAID via Flickr, public domain.
The year 2019 saw major movements, both on- and offline, to advance the rights of girls and women in Nigeria. Will 2020 continue this momentum?
2019 has been the year of Nigerian women standing up & speaking out. Yaba market protest, the simultaneous protests in Abuja and Lagos calling for the head of Pastor Fatoyinbo & now the BBC Africa Eye doc on lecturers who ask for sex from female students. And many more examples
— Ayomide Tayo (@AOT2) October 7, 2019
In October 2019, women and girls in Kore-Kulani, Gombe state, in northeast Nigeria, marched against child marriage, where the practice is still legal and widely practiced.
In 2017, the United Nations Children’s Fund reported that over 43 percent of girls in Nigeria are married before the age of 18. Twelve out of 36 Nigerian states have not adopted Nigeria’s Child Rights Act 2003 and still lawfully practice child marriage. Many poor families in these states still rely on early marriage to stabilize their precarious economic conditions.
Human rights activists have argued that the term “child marriage” itself is misleading because girls do not voluntarily marry and that the early “marriage” of young girls is actually a form of sexual abuse, according to DevEx, a development website.
The Gombe protest against early marriage came on the heels of Nigeria’s recent uproars against sexual violence and prejudice against women in Nigeria.
A woman at a market in Nigeria breastfeeds while selling ingredients for soup, November 3, 2017. Photo by Cynthia Chukwufumnanya Ikem via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.
In early 2019, in Nigeria’s northern region locally known as Arewa — perhaps the most conservative part of Nigeria — many women collectively raged against sexual violence, both on- and offline, under the hashtag #ArewaMeToo. This happened when a young woman decided to divulge her own personal experience with an abusive relationship on Twitter. A wave of similar stories followed, according to Quartz. “ArewaMeToo provided a platform for many to voice shelved parts of their lives they had never shared before,” wrote journalist Fakhrriyyah Hashim.
In late 2018, the Market March movement took off as a direct reaction to constant harassment and violence against women in Yaba market, a popular open-air market in the heart of Lagos state. The march soon spread to other markets around the country throughout 2019. Women reported that harassment at the market had reduced as a result of the march, and women throughout Nigeria who had experienced similar plights then organised marches in their local markets.
This Twitter netizen said her “smooth” visit to Yaba market was a testament to the market march:
I just want to use this opportunity to say thank you to every single woman that went on the Yaba Market March.
You wonderful women have done more than you think – I walked into the market and it was smooth.
One man tapped my hand and his colleague was like ‘no touch am’
— מַלכָּה (@ladytiffs_) December 3, 2019
And this netizen wrote that things were not perfect but gradually getting better:
Truth be told, I had similar experience not long after the match. The guy said “I'm not going to touch you, just tell me what you want to buy”
However, there was another who held my hand and when I asked why, he said “your face cool”.
We are getting there gradually.
— Fabrics.Tech.Crochet (@Themmytaryoh) December 3, 2019
Market March organisers continued to document similar marches throughout 2019:
Saturday's march was a great first step into a long but tireless & determined journey towards bringing an end to sexual harassment & bullying at Ogbete Market. pic.twitter.com/7zpQUCCB1A
— #SayHerNameNigeria (@MarketMarch) March 25, 2019
Protests didn’t just address unidentified (mostly male) faces of harassment.
The #ChurchMeToo hashtag spoke to a country-wide protest against pastor Biodun Fatoyinbo the general overseer of a popular Nigerian church, Commonwealth of Zion Assembly (COZA), highlighting the church’s complacency in Fatoyinbo’s sexual misconduct against celebrity photographer Busola Dakolo, who accused the pastor of raping her when she was 16.
The allegation against Fatoyinbo broke on social media as a result of an interview with Dakolo in the Nigerian magazine YNaija, which was published on YouTube on June 27 and 28, 2019 respectively. This led to protests in front of COZA churches organised intentionally to clash with Sunday services.
On November 14, 2019, an Abuja High Court judge awarded a one million naira [about $ 2,700 United States dollars] fine against Dakolo for abusing “the judicial process,” because the case is “empty and purely sentimental.” However, Dakolo’s lawyers insist that Fatoyinbo remains a suspect in court.
The court may not have agreed with the protesters or Fatoyinbo's alleged victims, but it led to head pastors from other churches to chime in on the matter, some denouncing Fatoyinbo; The Vanguard reported that the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) declared that the embattled pastor is not one of its members. Citizens also condemned the church on- and offline, and some COZA members publicly denounced the church.
The #SexForGrades movement also swept Nigerian social media after BBC Eye released an investigative documentary called “Sex for Grades,” by Kiki Mordi, that highlighted widespread sexual harassment and blackmail of female students at Nigeria's top universities.
Boniface Igbeneghu, a professor at the University of Lagos, was exposed in the documentary making demands for sex with an underage high school graduate who sought admission to the university.  Igbeneghu has since been fired by the university and denounced by his church where he was a pastor.
Nigerian women lending their voices to the fight against sexual violence — on- and offline — has triggered a ripple effect, where more and more women are rising up and making noise against sexual harassment and oppression.
Women’s rights advocate, Rabiu Salisu Ibrahima, told Deutsche Welle (DW) that education and constant campaigning is one of the best tools for the fight against child marriage, for example. Ibrahima said that child marriage is more of a cultural issue rather than a religious one and proposed a combination of constant advocacy, girl child education and adult education as the recipe for change.
With luck and hard work, 2019’s intentional protests against gender-based oppression will be a catalyst that forces the Nigerian government to make women’s rights and wellbeing a priority in 2020.

author: Adetomiwa Isiaka


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#AustraliaBurning: Prime Minister’s handling of national disaster sparks widespread criticism · Global Voices
Kevin Rennie

Screenshot: Australian Broadcasting Corporation news video 8 January 2020
Australia’s unprecedented bushfire season still has a long way to go, following an early start combined with widespread and disastrous blazes.
In the latest estimates, over 100,000 square kilometres (40,000 sq miles) have been burnt, more than 2,200 homes destroyed, 28 people have lost their lives and countless livestock and wildlife have been killed. One estimate puts the loss of wildlife at over one billion, with hundreds of billions of insects possibly dead.
On top of the extensive coverage by mainstream media, the nation’s social media outlets have been consumed by the unfolding catastrophe.Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms have been abuzz with news of outbreaks, emergency warnings, evacuations, and endless updates.
The political and environmental dimensions have been worked over from one end of the continent to the other.
The leadership of Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been widely condemned. Morrison returned early from a family Christmas holiday in Hawaii after extensive criticism back home. Many considered his excuse lame in the extreme:
How real is this man?
Scott Morrison says Hawaii holiday was like taking ‘that extra plumbing contract’ on a Friday afternoon https://t.co/Y7CQTCetoy
— Peter Bromley (@Peteatthetop) December 23, 2019
Numerous short videos have been posted recently on recent Tiktok, a video-sharing networking service popular with young users and audiences, using the hashtag #ScoMo and attracting over 11 million views. They include this one from @onedavidofmany:
https://www.tiktok.com/@onedavidofmany/video/6769501089239665925
After his return, the PM was slammed for his delay in approving compensation for voluntary firefighters:
About bloody time…
Volunteer NSW firefighters to be compensated, government says https://t.co/lG6Sm6okpC
— Tim White (@thewinetwit) December 28, 2019
He was also slammed online for inaction and for holding a New Year’s Eve party at his official Kirribilli residence on Sydney Harbour:
I'm pretty f/ing angry. & you shld b, too.
Our country is leaderless & while it burns, instead of being the leader we need & want, Mr “I can't hold a hose” Morrison is having a NYE party.
‘Cos that's what u do when you r a feckless, spineless, rudderless #ScottyfromMarketing ?
— ShiannonCorcoran (@ShiannonC) December 31, 2019
Singer-songwriter Tex Perkins added fuel during the NYE celebrations by singing ‘The honeymoon is over':
Good on him!
Tex Perkins gives the finger to Scott Morrison on ABC https://t.co/TVDAdoY43A
— Anthony Element (@observationpt) December 31, 2019
The PM’s attempts to deflect calls for a change to his government’s climate policy were not welcomed by many down under or globally. Australia had been roundly criticised at the United Nations’ December climate conference in Madrid for undermining progress at the talks.
His perceived lack of action played out on several fronts. He had declined to meet with 23 former emergency services leaders who were warning about the severity of the coming fire season and seeking extra resources:
Former fire chiefs say more aerial firefighting resources are needed in Australia: Almost two dozen former leaders of emergency services organizations in Australia are recommending that the country’s aerial firefighting fleet needs to be increased.… https://t.co/Scuk5ubNyg #Fire pic.twitter.com/qBiugfb0cD
— Incident Media (@InciMedia) November 21, 2019
After his surprise election victory in May 2019, Morrison's skills as a people person had been praised as an electoral asset. However, his public image soured considerably when visiting fire-ravaged communities. He was abused by locals and his poor interpersonal skills were attacked when dealing with people who refused to shake his hand:
Someone tell Scott Morrison to stop grabbing traumatised people for photo ops#AustraliaBurning #bushfirecrisis #vicfires #NSWfires #bushfiresVIC #Mallacoota #AustralianFires #Bushfires #ClimateEmergency #ClimateChange #AustraliaBurns #australiaisburning pic.twitter.com/DScIkFLfTC
— Evie Lawson (@EvieLawson) January 3, 2020
An ongoing meme, #ScottyfromMarketing, suggested the PM’s style was spin rather than substance. Aussie actor Magda Szubanski captured the mood when Morrison released an advertisement promoting government action deploying military reservists:
Of ALL the things you could have spent #taxpayers money on during this “unprecedented” (which you were warned about) national crisis you spend it on an AD?!! This beggars belief. Too late to shut the gate now #ScottyfromMarketing …the horse has bolted https://t.co/K967N9Kh4K
— Magda Szubanski AO (@MagdaSzubanski) January 4, 2020
Even this show of action backfired somewhat following a serious communications breakdown with the New South Wales Rural Fire Service:
“The NSW RFS commissioner, Shane Fitzsimmons, said neither he nor defence force personnel working from the state control centre were informed by the prime minister, Scott Morrison, of a plan to deploy 3,000 army reservists to assist in the bushfire crisis” https://t.co/2nG6LeHvsy
— ?Ray Wilton ?? (@raywilton4) January 5, 2020
Graham Young, a climate skeptic and director of the Australian Institute for Progress, responded to criticism of Scott Morrison's Liberal National government on TRT, the Turkish public broadcasting service. Graham and some of those who commented on the video on his Facebook post were also concerned that “there is a lot of running Australia down”.
The PM has had some success in raising hazard reduction (prescribed burns outside the fire season) and arsonists have been pointed at as the cause of many fires. The Greens party and environmentalists have been blamed despite denials:
The Bush fires in Australia are not happening because of Climate Change. They are happening because of the Greens’ opposition to hazard reduction – a proven strategy that humans have employed to reduce fires for generations. https://t.co/BOPZylXubK
— C J Meade (@meade6487) January 8, 2020
The debate has played out on the #ArsonEmergency Twitter hashtag. Accusations of misinformation and disinformation have become common on both sides. BBC News presenter Ros Atkins's response was popular:
Ros fronts IMO one of the best current affairs shows in the world. Want to REALLY know the score on these wild claims? Try this. #AustralianBushfireDisaster https://t.co/lVykYBU4Bp
— Rohan Connolly (@rohan_connolly) January 9, 2020
Research has pointed to a deliberate campaign of disinformation:
This is HUGE deal. There is already an organic + coordinated effort to spread the ‘arson’, and partly the ‘eco terrorist arson’ narrative around the worldhttps://t.co/X4DnhFbZIThttps://t.co/sdiF83VR7P
But it isn't just social media. It's traditional media. Guys in offices.
— Ketan Joshi (@KetanJ0) January 7, 2020
Victoria Mollison called out one media empire for leading this:
We need to come to terms with the fact this orchestrated campaign is coming straight out of the Liberal National Murdoch propaganda machine. Australia is facing a national climate crisis, and at the same time we need to address a political media crisis.https://t.co/iL0fHOEsXx
— ?Queen Victoria (@Vic_Rollison) January 8, 2020
The New York Times has a detailed examination of critics of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, who see it as “a concerted effort to shift blame, protect conservative leaders and divert attention from climate change”.
The bushfire season still has a long way to go, so the PM will be hoping that his announcement of $AU 2 billion [USD 1.4 billion] for a national bushfire recovery agency helps to contain his negative political fortunes of late.

author: Kevin Rennie


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Taiwan presidential election: Tsai Ing-wen re-elected with record-breaking votes · Global Voices
Hong Kong Free Press

Screenshot from the live streaming of Tsai Ing-wen's victory speech.
The original post is written by Pei-ju Teng and published on Hong Kong Free Press on January 11, 2020. The following version is republished on Global Voices under a content partnership agreement.
Taiwan’s incumbent leader Tsai Ing-wen has won the presidential election with a record-breaking 8.1 million votes, defeating her Beijing-friendly rival Han Kuo-yu by a wide margin.
“Taiwan is showing the world how much we cherish our free and democratic way of life,” Tsai said at a press conference at 9pm on Saturday January 11, where she confirmed her victory.
A jubilant crowd of supporters outside the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) headquarters in Taipei burst into cheers as Tsai appeared on stage to address reporters.
Tsai polled comfortably ahead of her main contender Han of the Kuomintang Party after voting closed at 4pm on Saturday.
Final results show Tsai having received 8.17 million votes, or 57 percent of the total. Han received 5.52 million votes, or 39 percent.
Ballots cast of three candidates. Via HKFP's Twitter.
Over 14 million people voted, representing a 74.1 percent turnout, which is around 8 percent higher than 2016, but lower than Taiwan's early democratic elections.
As to the 113-seat legislature, the Democratic Progressive Party has kept its majority with 61 seats, but with a slightly reduced margin, down from 68 in 2016. The Kuomintang has gained three seats from 35 to 38.
In her initial remarks, Tsai thanked her supporters and urged them to put aside their political differences in order to embrace opponents “under the banner of democracy”:
I want to once again call upon Beijing authorities to remind them that peace, clarity, democracy and dialogue are key to positive cross-strait interactions and long-term development. I also hope that Beijing authorities understand that democratic Taiwan and our democratically-elected government will not concede to threats and intimidation.
At around 8:45pm, Han declared defeat in Kaohsiung – where he is mayor – in front of a crowd of supporters who expressed disappointment at the electoral loss of their preferred candidate.
“I have already made a phone call to President Tsai Ing-wen, to congratulate her [on the victory],” Han told supporters. He added that he had not put enough effort into his election campaign and failed to meet the expectations of his supporters.
Han said he would return to the municipal office in Kaohsiung next Monday to continue his responsibilities as the mayor. However, he is also facing a recall petition filed by civil groups and the pro-independence Taiwan State-building Party last December which calls for his resignation.
In response to the election failure, KMT Chairman Wu Den-yih announced his upcoming resignation, along with 11 top-ranking KMT officials, including vice chairmen and secretary-general, at the party's Central Standing Committee next week.

author: Hong Kong Free Press