World News

The Seoul Metropolitan Government said on Sept 27 it has conducted secret inspections into recent allegations of forced shopping, with findings confirming that such practices exist on some level among tourism packages there.

The city hired several foreign nationals to pose as tourists in seven low-priced package tours – three that were sold in China and four sold in Vietnam – to check the programmes’ quality.

Most of the packages focused more on shopping than tourism, which the city government’s agents said hindered them from enjoying Seoul’s history and culture.

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A new report obtained by Ukraine's allies points to a Chinese company sending a range of purpose-built military drones to Russia for testing, with the ultimate destination being Ukraine.

The deal occurred last year, according to a western official, who was unable to disclose the name of the company. However, they said there was “clear evidence now that Chinese companies are supplying Russia with deadly weapons for use in Ukraine”.

“While the Chinese government might not admit it, they are going to struggle to keep their increasing support under wraps,” added the official, appearing to accuse Beijing of being involved or aware of the delivery.

They also confirmed a Reuters report from earlier in the week that Russia is believed to have established a weapons programme in China to develop and produce long-range attack drones for use in the war against Ukraine. [...]

Weyland is one of hundreds of thousands of people across Germany who have embraced balkonkraftwerk, or balcony solar. Unlike rooftop photovoltaics, the technology doesn’t require users to own their home, and anyone capable of plugging in an appliance can set it up. Most people buy the simple hardware online or at the supermarket for about $550 (500 euros.)

More than 550,000 of them dot cities and towns nationwide, half of which were installed in 2023. During the first half of this year, Germany added 200 megawatts of balcony solar. Regulations limit each system to just 800 watts, enough to power a small fridge or charge a laptop, but the cumulative effect is nudging the country toward its clean energy goals while giving apartment dwellers, who make up more than half of the population, an easy way to save money and address the climate crisis.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3244714

A Hong Kong court on Thursday sentenced Stand News former editor-in-chief Chung Pui-kuen to 21 months in prison, while former acting editor-in-chief Patrick Lam was released after his sentence was reduced because of ill health.

Last month, the two were the first journalists to be convicted under a colonial-era sedition law since Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

Chung and Lam were found guilty of conspiracy to publish and reproduce seditious publications.

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[The court] He ruled that 11 articles that were published under Chung and Lam's leadership carried seditious intent.

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Chung and Lam were held behind bars for nearly a year after their arrests, before being released on bail in late 2022. Their trial began in October that year and lasted some 50 days.

Stand News, which has now closed down, was one of the last news outlets in Hong Kong to voice criticism of authorities amid a crackdown from Beijing after the 2019 protests.

The latest World Press Freedom Index from Reporters Without Borders ranked Hong Kong as the 135th out of 180 territories, down from 80th place in 2021 and 18th place in 2002.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3235819

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Openly defending one’s decision not to have children will be prosecuted in Russia. The State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, is preparing a bill under which authorities will impose fines of up to €50,000 ($55,580) for supporting “the refusal to have children.” The measure affects all areas of life — from casual conversation to films and books — and is a serious threat to the Russian feminist movement.

The crackdown on what the Kremlin calls the “childfree” movement will result in fines of up to 400,000 rubles for individuals (around $4,300), 800,000 rubles for civil servants ($8,600), and up to five million rubles ($55,580) for companies or other legal entities. Foreigners will also be deported.

There are thousands of reasons why a person may decide not to have children, but the Cabinet of ministers has asked the State Duma to make only three exceptions to the law: religious reasons, medical reasons or in the case of rape. It also alleges that there is a mass-organized childfree movement, even though the websites on this subject are little more than a curiosity; Russian newspapers cite the existence of groups on VKontakte, the Russian Facebook, which barely have 5,000 members.

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cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3247781

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Instead of spearheading China’s liberalisation, Western universities that benefit from Chinese money are increasingly vulnerable to pressure from its government.

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Through a combination of pressure tactics – including a global censorship regime, the weaponisation of informal Chinese networks, questionable party-state funding, and dependencies on “official China” – students and researchers are silenced, and higher education institutions are influenced.

Within many universities outside China, academic freedom has been compromised by Chinese funding. Dependent on the large funds that have been allocated to them, they are more inclined to do research in line with the CCP’s programme. More recently, the much publicised Hong Kong National Security Law allows anyone to be charged who challenges China’s national unity, regardless of nationality or territory. The Hong Kong National Security Law purports to have extraterritorial effect and therefore it is not limited to Chinese citizens or even those physically in Hong Kong. This inevitably contributes to a climate of self-censorship among academics.

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Unfortunately, rising authoritarianism, if not actual totalitarianism, in China has turned the tables on Western universities. Instead of spearheading the liberalisation of China, they have become vulnerable to Chinese pressure in the opposite direction. Their partnerships with Chinese universities have turned into potential liabilities as professors come under fire for not properly declaring Chinese funding, research grants are linked to human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and universities’ technology breakthroughs are being used to improve China’s system of mass surveillance.

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The Irish Centre for Human Rights and the University of Galway showed courage in accepting this gift of memory to [Chinese human rights activist] Liu. Statements of support by the university’s president and the director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights are significant. It is our hope that this example will encourage other universities to resist the pressure from Chinese money that might compromise their academic freedom.

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cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3233057

China's latest nuclear submarine sank during its construction earlier this year, senior US defense officials said on Thursday.

Satellite images from June showed cranes at the Wuchang shipyard where the Zhou-class attack submarine would have been docked.

These images indicate that the vessel likely sank between May and June, US officials told news agencies including the Associated Press and Reuters.

China has not confirmed the current status of the submarine.

Reports of a submarine sinking during construction could be a potential setback for China as it continues to expand its naval capacity.

"We are not familiar with the situation you mentioned and currently have no information to provide," a Chinese embassy spokesperson in Washington said.

A US official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told Reuters it was "not surprising" that China's navy would hide the sinking of the submarine.

"In addition to the obvious questions about training standards and equipment quality, the incident raises deeper questions about the PLA's internal accountability and oversight of China's defense industry — which has long been plagued by corruption," they added, using the acronym for the People's Liberation Army.

[...]Using technology not unlike the regenerative braking found in hybrids and electric vehicles, the trains they rode generated some of the power flowing to the EV chargers in the nearby parking lot, the lights illuminating the station, and the escalators taking them to the platforms.

Every time a train rumbles to a stop, the energy generated by all that friction is converted to electricity, which is fed through inverters and distributed throughout the subway system. One-third of that powers the trains; the rest provides juice to station amenities and a growing network of EV chargers.

Each year, residents and tourists take 440 million trips on Barcelona’s subway system, which includes 165 stations linked by 78 miles of track. The transit agency has installed three inverters so far; 13 more are in progress. Once they’re all in place by the end of September, it expects regenerative braking to provide 41 percent of the energy needed to power the trains, a renewable source of energy it says will save about 3.9 metric tons of CO2 emissions annually.

Travellers described being subjected to lawlessness, looting and brutality in a conflict that the UN says has forced more than 10.5 million people to flee their homes.

But it is sexual violence that has become a defining characteristic of the protracted conflict, which started as a power struggle between the army and the RSF but has since drawn in local armed groups and fighters from neighbouring countries.

The UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, has said rape is being used as “a weapon of war”.

A recent UN fact-finding mission documented several cases of rape and rape threats from members of the army, but found that large-scale sexual violence was committed by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and its allied militias, and amounted to violations of international law.

Lots of meme potential here!

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3229591

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The Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) presents unique challenges for air infrastructure superiority, with its high altitude and rugged terrain. While the expansion of airports and deployment of fighter jets and sophisticated radar systems have been traditional measures of this superiority, a less recognised but equally critical aspect is China's increasing rotary-wing capabilities at extreme altitudes.

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China's critical military infrastructure at higher altitudes is rapidly expanding in the challenging environment of the TAR. A vital part of this expansion is the proliferation of high-altitude heliports and helipads, which are quickly becoming crucial nodes in the People's Liberation Army (PLA) ground and air operations strategy.

These helipads, strategically placed near the Line of Actual Control (LAC) between India and China, disputed areas with Bhutan, and critical infrastructure like surface-to-missile (SAM) sites and military barracks, serve as logistics hubs. Their role in facilitating rapid troop and equipment movement underscores their strategic significance.

A Hong Kong Court has jailed two journalists who led a pro-democracy newspaper after they were found guilty in a landmark sedition case last month.

Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam, editors at the now-defunct Stand News media outlet, had published articles about the crackdown on civil liberties in the city under China.

Chung was sentenced to 21 months, while Lam was given 11 months, but was released on medical grounds. The publisher behind Stand News - Best Pencil - has been fined HK$5,000 (US$643; £480).

It is the first sedition case against journalists in Hong Kong since the territory's handover from Britain to China in 1997.

After a lengthy trial, which began in October 2022 and was originally scheduled to last just 20 days, district court judge Kwok Wai-kin Kwok found that 11 articles published by Stand News were seditious and that Stand News had become a "danger to national security".

Their newspaper's editorial line supported "Hong Kong local autonomy", Mr Kwok said in a written statement.

"It even became a tool to smear and vilify the Central Authorities [in Beijing] and the [Hong Kong] SAR Government," he added.

Archived version

Vladimir Putin’s statements about the Kremlin’s updated nuclear doctrine reveal his fear that Ukraine might be allowed to use long-range missiles to strike targets inside Russia, Lithuanian Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas has said.

“We have all heard Putin’s words; I believe the key message is not what he said, but that when he talks about the new concept, he clearly signals that granting long-range strike capabilities to Ukraine is a really important issue he fears,” Kasčiūnas told a press conference on Thursday.

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius, who is visiting Lithuania on Thursday, said the West is not intimidated by Putin’s “nuclear rhetoric”.

“I can reiterate that this is Putin’s rhetoric; he speaks loudly and spreads his threats, and we should not be intimidated by that. We will do what we consider right. He can spread this through his channels, but it will not scare us,” Pistorius said.

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Putin said later on Wednesday that the changes [in the political situation] would allow Russia to launch a nuclear response to a “massive air attack”.

Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had not yet received permission from the United States or the United Kingdom to use long-range missiles to strike targets on Russian territory.

[Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky is urging the West to allow this, but Washington is seeking more detailed information on how Kyiv would use these weapons and how their use would fit into a broader war strategy

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cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3201775

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It is long past time for Taiwan again to be included in the United Nations. Reasons include the need to address growing military tensions in the Taiwan Strait and to acknowledge Taiwan’s thriving democracy and economic importance.

That economic importance includes Taiwan’s enormous role in global supply chains. It produces more than 90 percent of the world’s high-end semiconductors and a significant portion of the advanced chips that drive the artificial intelligence revolution. Moreover, half of the world’s seaborne trade passes through the Taiwan Strait. Peace and stability around Taiwan has promoted global prosperity.

Meanwhile, China continues to intensify its aggression against Taiwan. Its attempts to change the status quo across the Taiwan Strait and expand its authoritarian ideology throughout the Indo-Pacific region are a profound threat to peace and security all around the world.

Speaking on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, the actress pointed out that even animals had more rights now in Afghanistan following increased restrictions on women.

In response, a Taliban spokesman said they "highly respected" women and would "never compare them to cats".

Streep's comments come after the Taliban government last month introduced a new set of "morality laws".

Among other things, these rules state that women's voices can no longer be heard in public and that they are not allowed to look directly at men they are not related to by blood or marriage.

The measures add to a litany of restrictions that the regime has imposed on Afghan women and girls since returning to power three years ago.

Women have to completely cover their faces and bodies when leaving their homes. Women and girls are also prevented from going to schools, parks, gyms and sport clubs. There are restrictions on the type of work that they are allowed to do.

"Today in Kabul a female cat has more freedom than a woman. A cat may go sit on her front stoop and feel the sun on her face, she may chase a squirrel in the park," Streep said on Monday at an event to raise awareness of Afghan women's rights at the UN headquarters in New York.