The UN Ocean Conference (UNOC) concluded today with significant progress made towards the ratification of the High Seas Treaty and a strong statement on a new plastics treaty signed by 95 governments.

Once ratified, it will be the only legal tool that can create protected areas in international waters, making it fundamental to protecting 30 percent of the world’s oceans by 2030.

Fifty countries, plus the European Union, have now ratified the Treaty.

New Zealand has signed but is yet to ratify.

Deep sea mining rose up the agenda in the conference debates, demonstrating the urgency of opposing this industry.

The expectation from civil society and a large group of states, including both co-hosts of UNOC, was that governments would make progress towards stopping deep sea mining in Nice.

UN Secretary-General Guterres said the deep sea should not become the “wild west“.

Four new pledges
French President Emmanuel Macron said a deep sea mining moratorium is an international necessity. Four new countries pledged their support for a moratorium at UNOC, bringing the total to 37.

Attention now turns to what actions governments will take in July to stop this industry from starting.

Megan Randles, Greenpeace head of delegation regarding the High Seas Treaty and progress towards stopping deep sea mining, said: “High Seas Treaty ratification is within touching distance, but the progress made here in Nice feels hollow as this UN Ocean Conference ends without more tangible commitments to stopping deep sea mining.

“We’ve heard lots of fine words here in Nice, but these need to turn into tangible action.

“Countries must be brave, stand up for global cooperation and make history by stopping deep sea mining this year.

“They can do this by committing to a moratorium on deep sea mining at next month’s International Seabed Authority meeting.

“We applaud those who have already taken a stand, and urge all others to be on the right side of history by stopping deep sea mining.”

Attention on ISA meeting
Following this UNOC, attention now turns to the International Seabed Authority (ISA) meetings in July. In the face of The Metals Company teaming up with US President Donald Trump to mine the global oceans, the upcoming ISA provides a space where governments can come together to defend the deep ocean by adopting a moratorium to stop this destructive industry.

Negotiations on a Global Plastics Treaty resume in August.

John Hocevar, oceans campaign director, Greenpeace USA said: “The majority of countries have spoken when they signed on to the Nice Call for an Ambitious Plastics Treaty that they want an agreement that will reduce plastic production. Now, as we end the UN Ocean Conference and head on to the Global Plastics Treaty negotiations in Geneva this August, they must act.

“The world cannot afford a weak treaty dictated by oil-soaked obstructionists.

“The ambitious majority must rise to this moment, firmly hold the line and ensure that we will have a Global Plastic Treaty that cuts plastic production, protects human health, and delivers justice for Indigenous Peoples and communities on the frontlines.

“Governments need to show that multilateralism still works for people and the planet, not the profits of a greedy few.”

Driving ecological collapse
Nichanan Thantanwit, project leader, Ocean Justice Project, said: “Coastal and Indigenous communities, including small-scale fishers, have protected the ocean for generations. Now they are being pushed aside by industries driving ecological collapse and human rights violations.

“As the UN Ocean Conference ends, governments must recognise small-scale fishers and Indigenous Peoples as rights-holders, secure their access and role in marine governance, and stop destructive practices such as bottom trawling and harmful aquaculture.

“There is no ocean protection without the people who have protected it all along.”

The anticipated Nice Ocean Action Plan, which consists of a political declaration and a series of voluntary commitments, will be announced later today at the end of the conference.

None will be legally binding, so governments need to act strongly during the next ISA meeting in July and at plastic treaty negotiations in August.

Republished from Greenpeace Aotearoa with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By Helen Musa in Canberra

Former Palestinian diplomat and long-time Canberra identity Ali Kazak died on Saturday en route to Palestine.

Sources at the Canberra Islamic Centre report that he was recovering from heart surgery and died during a stopover in Thailand.

Kazak was born in Haifa in 1947 and grew up in Syria as a Palestinian refugee. He and his mother were separated from his father when Israel was created in 1948 and Kazak was only reunited with his father in 1993.

In 1968, while at Damascus University, Kazak had been invited to join the Palestine National Liberation Movement (Fateh) and joined its political wing.

He migrated to Australia in 1970 where he became the founder, publisher and co-editor of the Australian newspaper, Free Palestine, also authoring among many books, The Jerusalem Question and Australia and the Arabs.

Kazak was the driving force behind the establishment in 1981 of the Palestine Human Rights Campaign and was appointed by the PLO executive committee as the PLO’s representative to Australia, NZ and the Pacific region.

In 1982, he established the Palestine Information Office, which was recognised by the Australian government in 1989 as the office of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, and then further recognised in 1994 as the General Palestinian Delegation.

As Palestinian Ambassador, Kazak initiated the establishment of the NSW State and Australian Federal Parliamentary Friends of Palestine, as well as the Victorian, South Australian and NZ Parliamentary Friends of Palestine.

Always a passionate advocate, in 1986 he became the first person to call for adjudication by the Australian Press Council of stereotyped reporting of Palestinians.

After retiring from diplomacy, he became the managing director of the consultancy company Southern Link International, but continued to comment on Palestinian affairs and Gaza.

His most recent article was published in the Pearls and Irritations: John Menadue’s Public Policy journal on May 16, titled The third Nakba in Israel’s war of genocide: Why does the Albanese government shirk its responsibility?

Arrangements are being made to return his body from Thailand to Australia for internment.

Helen Musa is the Canberra City News arts editor. This article was first published by City News.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

French Polynesia has just played host to a 15-nation “Marara” military exercise aimed at increasing “interoperability” between participating armed forces.

From May 27 to June 8, the exercise involved about 1000 military from Australia, New Zealand, United States, Malaysia, Japan, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Cook Islands, Vanuatu, Tonga, Fiji, Canada, the Netherlands and Peru.

For the occasion, Japan’s helicopter carrier LST Kunisaki was used as a joint command post in what is described as a realistic simulation of an international relief operation to assist a fictitious Pacific island country struck by a grave natural disaster.

Military transport planes and patrol boats were also brought into the exercise by participating countries.

“Marara 2024 illustrates France’s commitment to reinforce security and stability in the Pacific . . . and its ability to cooperate with nations of the region for the benefit of the people,” the French Armed forces in French Polynesia said in a media release.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

In the aftermath of Palestinian group Hamas’ terror attack inside Israel on October 7 and the Israeli state’s even more terrifying attacks on Palestinian urban neighbourhoods in Gaza, the media across many parts of Asia tend to take a more neutral stand in comparison with their Western counterparts.

A lot of sympathy is expressed for the plight of the Palestinians who have been under frequent attacks by Israeli forces for decades and have faced ever trauma since the Nakba in 1948 when Zionist militia forced some 750,000 refugees to leave their homeland.

Even India, which has been getting closer to Israel in recent years, and one of Israel’s closest Asian allies, Singapore, have taken a cautious attitude to the latest chapter in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Soon after the Hamas attacks in Israel, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that he was “deeply shocked by the news of terrorist attacks”.

He added: “We stand in solidarity with Israel at this difficult hour.” But, soon after, his Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) sought to strike a balance.

Addressing a media briefing on October 12, MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi reiterated New Delhi’s “long-standing and consistent” position on the issue, telling reporters that “India has always advocated the resumption of direct negotiations towards establishing a sovereign, independent and viable state of Palestine” living in peace with Israel.

Singapore has also reiterated its support for a two-state solution, with Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam telling Today Daily that it was possible to deplore how Palestinians had been treated over the years while still unequivocally condemning the terrorist attacks carried out in Israel by Hamas.

“These atrocities cannot be justified by any rationale whatsoever, whether of fundamental problems or historical grievances,” he said.

“I think it’s fair to say that any response has to be consistent with international law and international rules of war”.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has blamed the rapidly worsening conflict in the Middle East on a lack of justice for the Palestinian people.

Lack of justice for Palestinians
“The crux of the issue lies in the fact that justice has not been done to the Palestinian people,” Beijing’s top diplomat said in a phone call with Brazil’s Celso Amorim, a special adviser to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, according to Japan’s Nikkei Asia.

The call came just ahead of an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on October 13 to discuss the Israel-Hamas war. Brazil, a non-permanent member, is chairing the council this month.

Indonesian President Jokowi Widodo called for an end to the region’s bloodletting cycle and pro-Palestinian protests have been held in Jakarta.

“Indonesia calls for the war and violence to be stopped immediately to avoid further human casualties and destruction of property because the escalation of the conflict can cause greater humanitarian impact,” he said.

“The root cause of the conflict, which is the occupation of Palestinian land by Israel, must be resolved immediately in accordance with the parameters that have been agreed upon by the UN.”

Indonesia, which is home to the world’s largest Muslim population, has supported Palestinian self-determination for a long time and does not have diplomatic relations with Israel.

But, Indonesia’s foreign ministry said 275 Indonesians were working in Israel and were making plans to evacuate them.

Sympathy for the Palestinians
Meanwhile, Thailand said that 18 of their citizens have been killed by the terror attacks and 11 abducted.

In the Philippines, Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo said on October 10 that the safety of thousands of Filipinos living and working in Israel remained a priority for the government.

There are approximately 40,000 Filipinos in Israel, but only 25,000 are legally documented, according to labour and migrant groups, says Benar News, a US-funded Asian news portal.

According to India’s MEA spokesperson Bagchi, there are 18,000 Indians in Israel and about a dozen in the Palestinian territories. India is trying to bring them home, and a first flight evacuating 230 Indians was expected to take place at the weekend, according to the Hindu newspaper.

It is unclear what such large numbers of Asians are doing in Israel. Yet, from media reports in the region, there is deep concern about the plight of civilians caught up in the clashes.

Benar News reported that Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has spoken with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan about resolving the Palestine-Israel conflict according to UN-agreed parameters.

Also this week, the Malaysian government announced it would allocate 1 million ringgit (US$211,423) in humanitarian aid for Palestinians.

Western view questioned
Sympathy for the Palestinian cause is reflected widely in the Asian media, both in Muslim-majority and non-Muslim countries. The Western unequivocal support for Israel, particularly by Anglo-American media, has been questioned across Asia.

Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post’s regular columnist Alex Lo challenged Hamas’ “unprovoked” terror attack in Israel, a narrative commonly used in Western media reporting of the latest flare-up.

“It must be pointed out that what Hamas has done is terrorism pure and simple,” notes Lo.

“But such horrors and atrocities are not being committed by Palestinian militants without a background and a context. They did not come out of nowhere as unadulterated and uncaused evil”.

Thus Lo argues, that to claim that the latest terror attacks were “unprovoked” is to whitewash the background and context that constitute the very history of this unending conflict in Palestine.

US media’s ‘morally reprehensible propaganda’
“It’s morally reprehensible propaganda of the worst kind that the mainstream Anglo-American media culture has been guilty of for decades,” he says.

“But the real problem with that is not only with morality but also with the very practical politics of searching for a viable peace settlement”.

He is concerned that “with their unconditional and uncritical support of Israel, the West and the United States in particular have essentially made such a peace impossible”.

Writing in India’s Hindu newspaper, Denmark-based Indian professor of literature Dr Tabish Khair points out that historically, Palestinians have had to indulge in drastic and violent acts to draw attention to their plight and the oppressive policies of Israel.

“The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), under Yasser Arafat’s leadership, used such ‘terrorist’ acts to focus world attention on the Palestinian problem, and without such actions, the West would have looked the other way while the Palestinians were slowly airbrushed out of history,” he argues.

While the PLO fought a secular Palestinian battle for nationhood, which was largely ignored by Western powers, this lead to political Islam’s development in the later part of the 1970s, and Hamas is a product of that.

“Today, we live in a world where political Islam is associated almost entirely with Islam — and almost all Muslims,” he notes.

Palestinian cause still resonates
But, the Palestinian cause still resonates beyond the Muslim communities, as the reactions in Asia reflect.

Indian historian and journalist Vijay Prashad, writing in Bangladesh’s Daily Star, notes the savagery of the impending war against the Palestinian people will be noted by the global community.

He points out that Hamas was never allowed to function as a voice for the Palestinian people, even after they won a landslide democratic election in Gaza in January 2006.

“The victory of Hamas was condemned by the Israelis and the West, who decided to use armed force to overthrow the election result,” he points out.

“Gaza was never allowed a political process, in fact never allowed to shape any kind of political authority to speak for the people”.

Prashad points out that when the Palestinians conducted a non-violent march in 2019 for their rights to nationhood, they were met with Israeli bombs that killed 200 people.

“When non-violent protest is met with force, it becomes difficult to convince people to remain on that path and not take up arms,” he argues.

Prashad disputes the Western media’s argument that Israel has a “right to defend itself” because the Palestinians are people under occupation. Under the Geneva Convention, Israel has an obligation to protect them.

Under the Geneva Convention, Prashad argues that the Israeli government’s “collective punishment” strategy is a war crime.

“The International Criminal Court opened an investigation into Israeli war crimes in 2021 but it was not able to move forward even to collect information”.

Kalinga Seneviratne is a correspondent for IDN-InDepthNews, the flagship agency of the non-profit International Press Syndicate (IPS). Republished under a Creative Commons licence.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

In this the seventh episode of A View from Afar podcast for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning examine the strengths and weaknesses of democracy around the world.

In particular Paul and Selwyn consider how and why democracy in many countries around the world is on the slide.

They examine the causes of democratic backsliding and also test why the erosion of high democratic ideas have, in many cases, popular support.

First, Paul offers a context, and defines democratic backsliding. He identifies the countries that are decisively eroding their own democracies of principles that were once embraced by both power elites and citizenry.

The Questions include:

• Why are we seeing more democratic backsliding in recent times?
• Is it just a political phenomenon or does it extend beyond the political sphere?
• Where has democratic backsliding been most evident?
• What do Chile, Guatemala, Israel and Thailand have in common when it comes to backsliding?
• What is occurring in the United States?
• If a democracy “backslides,” what does it slide into?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recordings of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this the seventh episode of A View from Afar podcast for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will examine the strengths and weaknesses of democracy around the world.

In particular Paul and Selwyn will consider how and why democracy in many countries around the world is on the slide.

They will examine the causes of democratic backsliding and also test why the erosion of high democratic ideas have, in many cases, popular support.

First, Paul will give us a context, and will define democratic backsliding. He will identify the countries that are decisively eroding their own democracies of principles that were once embraced by both power elites and citizenry.

The Questions:

• Why are we seeing more democratic backsliding in recent times?
• Is it just a political phenomenon or does it extend beyond the political sphere?
• Where has democratic backsliding been most evident?
• What do Chile, Guatemala, Israel and Thailand have in common when it comes to backsliding?
• What is occurring in the United States?
• If a democracy “backslides,” what does it slide into?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Analysis by Geoffrey Miller.

New Zealand’s independent foreign policy is back. That’s a key underlying message from Jacinda Ardern’s trip this week to Southeast Asia.

The New Zealand Prime Minister attended the East Asia Summit in Cambodia over the weekend. She will head to Thailand for the APEC leaders’ meeting later in the week.

In between, Ardern is also making a surprise four-day bilateral visit to Vietnam.

As has become customary for much of Ardern’s foreign travel, the Vietnam portion of this week’s trip is being branded as a ‘trade mission’, a strategy deployed in part to deflect potential domestic criticism of the PM for spending too much time on the diplomatic circuit abroad.

Ardern all but admitted in interviews prior to embarking on her Asia trip that her no-show at the COP27 summit in Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh was driven by an unwillingness to spend too much time outside New Zealand.

While it is certainly true that there is a strong trade foundation to New Zealand’s ties with Vietnam – the country is New Zealand’s 14^th biggest export market – there is probably a little more to it than that.

So far in 2022, most of Jacinda Ardern’s international travel has been focused on countries in the Western-led camp that has been vocal in condemning Russia for its war on Ukraine.

In April, Ardern’s first travel outside New Zealand since early 2020 was pointedly to Singapore and Japan – two of the few Asian countries that had sanctioned Russia.

Trips to the United Kingdom, United States (to meet Joe Biden at the White House), Spain (as an invited guest at the NATO summit), Belgium (to sign a free trade deal with the EU) and Australia then followed.

But by mid-year, there seemed to be a realisation inside Ardern’s Labour Government that New Zealand had tacked too far towards the West in the first six months of 2022.

New Zealand’s increasingly pro-Western foreign policy had begun to irk China. The warning signs from Beijing led Ardern to recalibrate in speeches in July and August, in which she emphasised New Zealand’s traditional independent foreign policy and sought to put a little more daylight between Wellington and Washington.

However, these recalibration speeches were themselves delivered to Western audiences in London, Sydney and Auckland.

Until now, the shift had not really been reflected in the Prime Minister’s travel schedule, which in recent months focused on the Pacific and also included a trip to London (for the Queen’s funeral) and New York (for the UN General Assembly).

The return of in-person gatherings for both the East Asia Summit (EAS) and APEC formats is particularly welcome news for New Zealand, which as a small country receives fewer such multilateral opportunities.

Moreover, amidst heightened geopolitical polarisation, the broadly inclusive nature of both the EAS and APEC – which brings together Russia, China, the United States and many smaller members from around the Pacific Rim – is now almost priceless.

And when viewed through a trade lens alone, APEC will give New Zealand’s Prime Minister a particularly invaluable opportunity to develop connections with leaders who otherwise might not receive the attention from Wellington that they deserve.

This is particularly true for Latin America, which is represented at APEC by Chile, Mexico and Peru.

Of the three, Mexico currently holds the greatest significance for New Zealand: trade in both directions is surging. The country now sits comfortably inside New Zealand’s top 30 export markets, in 26^th place.

Ardern has yet to visit Latin America since becoming PM in 2017, although she did hold a sideline meeting with Chilean President Gabriel Boric at the UN General Assembly in September. In June, Ardern also dispatched her education minister, Chris Hipkins, to Chile and Brazil to promote New Zealand’s international education sector which had suffered greatly from border restrictions during the pandemic.

Jacinda Ardern’s international popularity – which has only increased during the Covid-19 era – means that she can easily secure sideline meetings with leaders at bigger gatherings.

Furthermore, the summits in Cambodia and Thailand – and especially the side trip to Vietnam – provide the Prime Minister with her best opportunity yet to learn about the foreign policy stances being taken by non-Western countries.

Vietnam is a case in point.

Hanoi has long maintained friendly ties with Moscow, a friendship built on Russia’s support and solidarity for the like-minded, communist Vietnam during the Cold War.

In 2022, this strong relationship has seen Hanoi refrain from criticising Moscow’s war on Ukraine (at least in public) – and led Vietnam to abstain on key votes in March and October which condemned Russia in the UN General Assembly.

Moreover, Vietnam’s Nguyen Phu Trong – the country’s communist leader – recently chose to visit China for his first foreign trip since 2019.

Trong’s visit to Beijing was the first by a foreign leader since Xi Jinping received a third term at October’s Communist Party Congress. The symbolism and warmth of the trip showed that Vietnam will not be easily swayed by US pressure to throw its lot in with the West, despite the existence of genuine tensions between Hanoi and Beijing over the South China Sea.

As if to avoid any doubt, Trong called Vietnam’s relationship with China his ‘top priority’ while in Beijing and firmly ruled out joining military alliances – a pledge which would have been music to Xi’s ears.

The bonhomie in Beijing represented a setback of sorts for Washington, which had offered a carrot to Hanoi by including it in the US’s new Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) initiative earlier in the year. The IPEF is vague and uninspiring overall, but a focus on ‘supply chain resilience’ is an indication that its main purpose is to be a vehicle that challenges China’s economic dominance.

Still, the IPEF involvement – and Vietnam’s coolness towards Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and new Global Security Initiative (GSI) – shows that Hanoi is likely to continue to forge a foreign policy that walks a tightrope between both Washington and Beijing.

In Vietnam, this strategy is sometimes referred to ‘bamboo diplomacy’ – tough when required, but flexible when needed.

While in Vietnam this week, Jacinda Ardern may want to give some thought to Vietnam’s approach.

After all, there are some remarkable similarities between Vietnam’s bamboo diplomacy and New Zealand’s own ‘independent foreign policy’ positioning that seeks to keep both China – its biggest trading partner by far – and traditional Western partners on side.

New Zealand’s greatest foreign policy challenge is threading this geopolitical needle.

The good news is that other countries in the Indo-Pacific – and further afield – are facing this challenge too.

Jacinda Ardern can learn from them.

Geoffrey Miller is the Democracy Project’s geopolitical analyst and writes on current New Zealand foreign policy and related geopolitical issues. He has lived in Germany and the Middle East and is a learner of Arabic and Russian.

Further reading on international relations and the PM at the East Asia Summit

Claire Trevett (Herald): PM Jacinda Ardern at the East Asia Summit: A call to do more in Myanmar, flags concern about China
Benedict Collins (1News): ‘Sober’ East Asia Summit concludes
Claire Trevett (Herald): The PM’s hustle – Jacinda Ardern’s sharp elbow work to get face time with US President Joe Biden (paywalled)
Thomas Manch (Stuff): Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ‘optimistic’ as leaders discuss worsening world crises
Jo Moir (Newsroom): No shortage of ‘stains on the region’ at East Asia Summit
Claire Trevett (Herald): PM Jacinda Ardern arrives for East Asia Summit: ‘Storm clouds’ over region
Gyles Beckford (RNZ): Myanmar govt’s executions ‘a stain on region’ – Jacinda Ardern
RNZ: PM Jacinda Ardern hopes to drive regional consensus at Asian summits
1News: Govt announces upgrade to ASEAN trade deal
Amelia Wade (Newshub): Myanmar’s executions ‘a stain on our region’, Jacinda Ardern says, as week of southeast Asian mega meetings begins
Thomas Manch (Stuff): PM Jacinda Ardern sits down with world leaders for East Asia Summit; Putin a no show
Amelia Wade (Newshub): Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern jets off to Southeast Asia, racking up the air miles for summit season
Jamie Gray (Herald): What Xi Jinping’s re-election in China means for NZ Inc (paywalled)
Nicholas Khoo (Stuff): Why NZ’s morality narrative on Ukraine doesn’t work

Other items of interest and importance today

GOVERNMENT AND PARLIAMENT
Jamie Ensor (Newshub): 2023 election: The key parties, latest polling, main issues, cost of living
Audrey Young (Herald): Luxon’s first year as leader: Tackling Ardern and her ‘career politician’ colleagues (paywalled)
Claire Trevett (Herald): Polls deliver cold, hard reality for the Labour Party and Jacinda Ardern – but is Winston Peters benefiting? (paywalled)
Anna Whyte (Stuff): ‘Hell of a rush to get stuff done’: Should elections be held every four years?
Peter Wilson (RNZ): Week in Politics: A poll, a reappointment and an interesting by-election line up
The Standard: Why is Labour such a hard sell now?
Leena Tailor (Women’s Weekly/Herald): From migrant to minister: Priyanca Radhakrishnan’s power move
Steven Cowan: Trickle down feminism
Andrew Kirton (Herald): Speculation begins on the date of the next NZ election (paywalled)
Giles Dexter (RNZ): Under-fire Labour turns sights on bank profits and fuel
Phil Smith (RNZ): Reimagining Parliament
Ellie McKenzie (Transparency International): New Zealand lobbying oversight lacking in comparison to similar countries

THREE WATERS
1News: Three Waters: National’s policy to be revealed closer to election
Thomas Cranmer: The Three Waters select committee reports back
Glenn McConnell (Stuff): Everyone agrees to change Three Waters, but no one agrees what the changes should be
Jonathan Milne (Newsroom): The woman whose impassioned plea won over Three Waters MPs
Shane Reti (Herald): Three Waters legislation may be rammed through under urgency (paywalled)
James Perry (Māori TV): Changes to Three Waters reform but co-governance to stay
Rebecca Howard (BusinessDesk): Mahuta welcomes 3 waters report (paywalled)
Brent Edwards (NBR): Three Waters reform to go through largely unchanged (paywalled)
Adam Pearse (Herald): Three Waters co-governance retained after 88,000 public submissions
RNZ: Three Waters: Government agrees to changes after Select Committee recommendations

ECONOMY, EMPLOYMENT AND INEQUALITY
RNZ: Reserve Bank created ‘perfect storm’ for inequality – Bernard Hickey
Damien Grant (Stuff): Bank profits aren’t the problem, the Reserve Bank is
Herald: Big power companies delivering excess dividends in the billions, new study claims
Luke Malpass (Stuff): Adrian Orr, Grant Robertson, National and the price of money
Bernard Hickey: A post-mortem on an inter-generational and institutional tragedy (paywalled)
Tom Hunt (Stuff): Workers needing food help the new normal as Wellington prices soar
Heather du Plessis-Allan (Herald): Reserve Bank governor needs to wake up to his role (paywalled)
Fran O’Sullivan (Herald): Less fire, more ice-water please, governor (paywalled)
Steven Joyce (Herald): Grant Robertson risks undermining Reserve Bank independence (paywalled)
Eric Crampton (Stuff): We all turn a little bit crazy when prices rise in a crisis
John Roughan (Herald): There’s more to inflation than wages (paywalled)
Hillmarè Schulze (NBR): Māori households are getting poorer despite increased Govt funds (paywalled)
Debbie Ngarewa-Packer (Herald): It’s time to break up the old boys’ network and give land back
Shauni James (Herald): Rotorua Salvation Army Foodbank records 89pc surge in demand ahead
Matt Cowley (Herald): Is the Fair Pay Agreement fair play? (paywalled)
Calida Stuart-Menteath and Hamish McNicol (NBR): Windfall taxing big banks’ profit is not the answer (paywalled)
Andrea Vance (Stuff): Air New Zealand no longer delivers the service it sells, nor can it handle it when things go wrong

HOUSING
John Minto (Daily Blog): Hundreds of millions in state house land sold by Labour in the middle of a housing catastrophe
Catherine Hubbard (Stuff): Motel owners at the coal face of the housing shortage
Sonya Bateson (Herald): Stop the blame game on emergency housing – we need action
Miriam Bell (Stuff): Rent increases are stabilising, but at a high level

HEALTH
Virginia Fallon (Stuff): The whole tooth: Pliers, shame and the biting cost of dental care in New Zealand
Newshub: Dentist visibly emotional as he spells out consequences Kiwis face when they don’t visit dentist
Aaron Dahmen (Herald): ‘We have to do better’ – Government considering paid placements for nursing students
Adam Pearse (Herald): ‘Erosion of investment’: How the latest addition to Te Whatu Ora’s board sees the future of healthcare
Phil Pennington (RNZ): Four major hospital upgrade projects in South Island face uncertainty
RNZ: Emergency department pressures: Te Whatu Ora ‘doing what we can’
Janine Rankin (Stuff): Private hospital theatre promises surgery for more public patients
Samantha Heath (Herald): Aged care in critical need (paywalled)

EDUCATION
Erin Gourley and Gianina Schwanecke (Stuff): Principals warn literacy and numeracy changes could ‘provoke a crisis’
Emma Hatton (Newsroom): Pleas for complete overhaul of teacher aide funding system
Anna Whyte (Stuff): Primary teachers to decide on pay offer, union labels it ‘well short’
Greg Newbold: English literacy essential
Jerry Coyne: Shamanism makes comeback in New Zealand

MEDIA
Colin Peacock (RNZ): Herald’s bid to short-circuit short-termism and tribalism
Hayden Donnell (RNZ): Annoying both sides doesn’t equal getting it right
Steve Braunias (Herald): The Secret Diary of Plunket and Farrier (paywalled)
Grant Duncan: Newshub’s biased poll reporting
Eric Crampton: Watching Mediawatch

CLIMATE
Timothy Welch (The Conversation): Why giving the Commerce Commission the power to set ‘fair’ fuel prices is unfair on NZ’s climate targets
1News: Shaw on $20m climate payout: NZ has ‘duty to support’ Pacific
Rod Oram (Newsroom): NZ absent on COP 27 agriculture day
Hamish McNicol (NBR): Climate reporting and the law of unintended consequences (paywalled)

OTHER
Philip Matthews (Stuff): Jim Anderton: Hero, rebel or both?
Michelle Duff (Stuff): NZ childcare affordability is the worst in the world, Government discovers
Simon Wilson (Herald): Inside the Auckland mayoral race: How did Wayne Brown win so well and Efeso Collins lose so badly? (paywalled)
Deborah Morris (Stuff): Police error sinks Parliament protester’s trespass charge, exposing loophole
Matthew Slaughter (Stuff): Difficult Conversations: Are we becoming reluctant to speak our minds?
Clive Bibby (Kiwiblog): Let’s have a debate based on the facts
Greg Bruce (Herald): Millennials aren’t real. Nor are Boomers, Zoomers or Gen X-ers (paywalled)

Indonesia’s popular tourism islands of Bali opened for tourism last week, while Thailand announced that from November 1 vaccinated travellers from 19 countries will be allowed to visit the kingdom including its tourism island of Phuket.

Both those countries’ tourism industry, which is a major revenue earner, has been devastated by more than 18 months of inactivity that have impacted on the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of people.

India and Vietnam also announced plans to open the country to vaccinated foreign tourists in November, and Australia will be opening its borders for foreign travel from mid-November for the first time since March 2020.

Countries in the Asia-Pacific region — except for China — are now beginning to grapple with balancing the damage to their economies from covid-19 pandemic by beginning to treat the virus as another flu.

The media may have to play a less adversarial role if this gamble is going to succeed.

October 11 was “Freedom Day” for Australia’s most populous city Sydney when it came out of almost four months of a tough lockdown.

Ironically this is happening while the daily covid-19 infection rates are higher than the figure that triggered the lockdowns in June.

‘It’s not going away’
Yet, New South Wales Premier Dominic Perrottet told Sky News on October 11: “we’ve got to live alongside the virus, it’s not going away, the best thing that we can do is protect our people (by better health services)”.

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, addressing the nation on October 9, said: “Singapore cannot stay locked down and closed off indefinitely. It would not work, and it would be very costly”.

He added, “each time we tighten up, businesses are further disrupted, workers lose jobs, children are deprived of a proper childhood and school life”.

Singapore is coming out of lockdown when it is facing the highest rates of daily infections since the covid-19 outbreak.

Both Singapore and Australia adopted a “zero-covid” policy when the first wave of the pandemic hit, quickly closing the borders, and going into lockdown.

Both were exceptionally successful in controlling the virus and lifting the lockdowns late last year with almost zero covid-19 cases. But, when the more contagious delta virus hit both countries, fear came back forcing them back into lockdowns.

However, PM Lee told Singaporeans that lockdowns had “caused psychological and emotional strain, and mental fatigue for Singaporeans and for everyone else. Therefore, we concluded a few months ago that a “Zero covid” strategy was no longer feasible”.

‘Living with covid-19’
Thus, Singapore has changed its policy to “Living with covid-19”.

In a Facebook posting on October 10, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said: “The phenomenal response from Australians to go and get vaccinated as we’ve seen those vaccination rates rise right across the country, means it’s now time that Australians are able to reclaim their lives. We’re beating covid, and we’re taking our lives back.”

On October 8, Australia’s Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said that though infection rates might still be a bit high, yet less than 1 percent of those infected were in intensive care units (ICUs).

Why didn’t political leaders take this attitude right from the beginning and continue with it? After all the fatality rate of covid-19 has not been that much higher than the seasonal flu in most countries.

True, it was perhaps more contagious according to medical opinion, but fatality rates were not that large in percentage figures.

According to the Worldometer of health statistics, there have been 237.5 million covid-19 infections up to October this year and 214.6 million have recovered fully (90.4 percent) while 4.8 million have died (just over 2 percent).

According to the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates, there have been between 39-56 million flu cases, about 700,000 flu hospitalisations recorded in the US during the 2019-2020 flu season up to April 2020.

They also estimate between 24,000 to 62,000 flu deaths during the season. But did the media give these figures on a daily or even a weekly basis?

New global influenza strategy
In March 2019, WHO launched a new global influenza strategy pointing out that each year there is an estimated 1 billion flu cases of which 3-5 million are severe cases, resulting in 290,000 to 650,000 influenza-related respiratory deaths.

This has been happening for many years, but, yet the global media did not create the panic scenario that accompanied covid-19.

Unfortunately, the media’s adversarial reporting culture has helped to create a fear psychosis from the very beginning of the outbreak in early 2020, which may have contributed to millions of deaths by creating anxiety among those diagnosed with covid-19.

During the peak of the delta pandemic in India, many patients died from heart attacks triggered by anxiety. Would they have died if covid-19 were treated as another flu?

In the US out of the 44 million infected with covid-19 only 1.6 percent died. In Brazil from 21.5 million infected, 2.8 percent of them died, while in India out of 34 million infected only 1.3 percent died.

But what did we see in media reports? Piles of dead bodies being burnt in India, from Brazil bodies buried in mass graves by health workers wrapped in safety gear and in the US, people being rushed into ICUs.

They are just a small fraction of those infected.

Bleak picture of sensationalism
I was the co-editor of a book just released by a British publisher that looked at how the media across the world reported the covid-19 outbreak during 2020. It paints a bleak picture of sensationalism and adversarial reporting blended with racism and politicisation.

It all started with the outbreak in Wuhan in January 2020 when the global media transmitted unverified video clips of people dropping dead in the streets and dead bodies lying in pavements. Along with the focus on “unhygienic” wet markets in China this helped to project an image of China as a threat to the world.

It contributed to the fear psychosis that was built up by the media tinged with racism and politicisation.

If we are to live with covid and other flu viruses, greater investments need to be made in public health.

In Australia, health experts are talking about boosting hospital bed and ICU capacities to deal with the new policy of living with covid, and they have also warned of a shortage of health professionals, especially to staff ICUs.

What about if the media focus on these as national security priorities? Rather than giving daily death rates and sensational stories of people dying from covid — do we give daily death rates from heart attacks or suicide?

We should start discussing more about how to create sustainable safe communities as we recover from the pandemic, and that includes better investments in public health.

We need a journalism culture that is less adversarial and more tuned into promoting cooperation and community harmony.

Kalinga Seneviratne is co-editor of COVID-19, Racism and Politicization: Media in the Midst of a Pandemic published in August 2021 by Cambridge Scholars Publishers. IDN is the flagship agency of the Non-profit International Press Syndicate. This article is republished in partnership with IDN.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By David Robie in Bangkok

A leading cyber security expert has called on universities to play a more active role in implementing ethics and legal frameworks for communications smart technology to save society from an Orwellian future.

Mohamed El-Guindy, an Egyptian consultant to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC-ROMENA), says communication research programmes should promote “ethically aligned” design.

In an era of “accelerated addictiveness” to smartphone and other digital technologies, he told media researchers, policy advisers and journalists at the 27th Asian Media Information and Communication (AMIC) conference in Bangkok, Thailand, this week that it was vital for democracy that universities stepped up.

READ MORE: Mohamed El-Guindy and the Global Institute for Global Security and Defence Affairs

He also said families and parents needed to be more critically active by balancing screen time and promoting “real social interaction”.

Addressing the “persuasive technologies” industry, Al-Guindy spoke about being  “hooked”, the “scrolling dopamine loop” and the “digital skinner box” models and how they had made smartphones fill psychological needs.

“Our social fabric is being torn apart,” he said.

“As we expect more from technology, we expect less from each other as people.

“We have suffered a loss of ability to focus without distraction. The result is mental health issues, less empathy and more confusion.”

‘Misinformation, lies’
Al-Guindy said societies were engulfed in “misinformation, propaganda and lies”.

He quoted from educator and media theorist Neil Postman’s book Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, originally published in 1985 and drawn from a talk reflecting on George Orwell’s 1984.

“Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in [Aldous] Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to ignore the technologies that undo their capacity to think.”

The three-day AMIC conference at Chulalongkorn University featured the theme “Are you human? Communication, Technology and New Humanism”.

Manila-based AMIC is the major global organisation focused on Asian media policy and research and publishes two leading journals, the Asian Journal of Communication and Media Asia.

AMIC board chair Professor Crispin Maslog challenged the more than 300 participants to take a more “humanist” approach to communication research and policy building.

“We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another,” he said. “In its scale, scope and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before.

“As the millennials would say, OMG!”

Climate change guide
Among four new international books about communication research and technology, prolific Filipino author Dr Maslog launched his 36th title, Science Writing and Climate Change.

Developed as a guide for journalists in the Asia-Pacific region, it has been co-authored with New Zealand’s Pacific Media Centre director Professor David Robie and regional editor Joel Adriano of SciDev.Net, a leading online publication with a focus of science and development.

Among several UNESCO delegates and speakers at the conference, Dorothy Gordon, of the governing board of the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education, called on participants to lobby through their national commissions and global agencies if they wanted action.

“Asia has the potential to be in control, it can make changes for tech for peace,” she said.

“UNESCO is made up of member states. If you want something to happen, you need to lobby your own country first to take up the issue.”

Malaysia’s Dr Azman Azwan Azmawati, an associate professor at the Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) in Penang and president of the Asian Congress for Media and Communication (ACMC), called for more critical research on patriarchal systems.

“It is crucial for more study of patriarchal systems because of their negative impact on women and stereotyping of women,” she said.

“The patriarchal system hinders women from reaching their potential.

Power imbalance
Much more research was needed to focus on the imbalance of power – ‘deconstructing the power of the powerful over the powerless.

“Cultural norms and mindsets must be re-examined, critiqued, reevaluated and rethought.”

Professor Mark Pearson of Australia’s Griffith University spoke of human rights advocacy journalism in a global justice context.

“Global justice can be a legitimate ethical objective of advocacy journalism, requiring factuality as a platform,” he said.

“It is achievable in some cases through a wise and intentional position of ‘advocacy journalism’ which sits comfortably with the professional values of the livelihood of journalists.”

He cited several examples of advocacy journalism in Australia and New Zealand, including Greenpeace investigative journalist Phil Vine.

Dr Pearson, author of The Journalist’s Guide to Media Law, also spoke about “mindful journalism”, a form of journalism with “wisdom and compassion” drawing from elements of secular Buddhist approaches to meditation and ethics.

He dedicated a separate paper on the topic to the memory of Dr Shelton Gunaratne, who died in March this year after being awarded the 2016 AMIC Asia Communication Award for his “ground-breaking scholarship and intellectual contribution to Asian media and communication research”.

High tech ‘slavery’
Professor Jack Linchuan Qiu, author of Goodbye iSlave and director of the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s C-Centre for Chinese Media and Comparative Communication Research, gave an inspired address on the impact of modern day “slavery” in the high tech industries.

Taiwan’s Professor Georgette Wang of the National Chengchi University engaged with the debate about Asian research methodologies, saying that perhaps the right questions were not being asked.

She said there was an absence of “East-West dialogue” over research methodologies and there needed to be more engagement.

Blaming globalisation, she said that while the “periphery” had gained greater presence in the international arena, it had also “brought the profile of theories and questions originating in the West to greater prominence”.

Instead of rejecting Western research models in an Asian context, more effort was needed to “develop a new paradigm” drawing on both East-West traditions.

New Zealand was represented by only three academics, Professor David Robie and Khairiah A. Rahman of Auckland University of Technology (AUT), and Dr Adam Brown of the Auckland Institute of Studies.

Dr Robie addressed the November 2018 referendum on independence and last month’s territorial elections in New Caledonia and the implications for the future in the Pacific; Rahman addressed the fallout from the Christchurch massacre on March 15 and “negotiating discrimination of the Pan-Asian identity”; and Dr Brown examined learner-centred, interactive learning strategies.

Next year’s AMIC conference will take place in Beijing hosted by the Chinese University of Communication (CUC).

Dr David Robie is the New Zealand country representative of AMIC.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By Jessica Marshall in Auckland

The Solomon Islands faces a “time bomb” with a youth unemployment rate of 82 percent and New Zealand needs to do more to help the Pacific country, says former Prime Minister Helen Clark.

Youth unemployment is “one of the huge challenges of our time”, she says.

“They’ve all got ideas, they want to do things, and . . . I really urge our aid programme to focus back on some of these basics again,” she told the annual conference of the National Council of Women (NCW) in Auckland yesterday.

READ MORE: Violence against women is a national crisis: Clark

Clark, former Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), is the new patron of NCW and is the author of a new book launched this weekend, Women, Equality, Power.

She said the New Zealand government needed to rethink how its aid programme was structured.

-Partners-

“A country like the Solomon Islands could have a future but it needs investment in its agriculture.”

She said New Zealand used to invest its aid programme – in places like Thailand, for example – in the country’s agriculture.

“How much focus have we got on agriculture now?” she asked.

‘No brainer’
“It’s just a no brainer to try to support people back into the value chain.”

She made the call during a discussion on the UN Sustainable Development Goals which Clark was instrumental in developing during her time with UNDP.

Dr Gill Greer, chief executive of NCW, said that the inclusive manner in which Clark went about developing the goals was “not typical of the UN at many times”.

“It was a vision, it is a vision,” said Dr Greer, adding that the goals did not go far enough on the issue of gender.

“The living framework has one indicator, and that is all, and in this room [of 200 people] just think of how many we could suggest immediately?”

Clark replied: “Gender is in every goal”.

Clark also discussed the issue of migrants in Nauru, proclaiming it to be a crisis.

“There is something fundamentally wrong, this is not a sustainable situation and it’s no way to treat people.”

Earlier yesterday, the BBC reported that children had been attempting suicide and self-harm on the island.

The Pacific Islands Forum leaders summit opens in Nauru tomorrow.

Jessica Marshall is a student journalist on AUT’s Postgraduate Diploma in Communication Studies (Journalism) course.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By Bob Howarth in Dili, Timor-Leste

The Dili Dialogue Forum, sponsored by UNESCO and organised by the Timor-Leste Press Council, will be held again next year after the inaugural successful one last week.

It is a forum of Asia/Pacific press councils and it hopes to become an alliance of all press councils in the region by next May. May 3 is World Press Freedom Day.

This year Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, South East Asia Press Alliance (SEAPA) and Thailand were represented. It was held in an US$8 million auditorium (capacity 400) in the high-rise new Ministry of Finance building.

Topics included country reports of press freedom, ethics, training, social media issues and cybersecurity for journalists.

The TL Press Council impressed delegates.

Timor-Leste at 95 has the highest Asian ranking in Reporters Sans Frontiers World Press Freedom Index.

-Partners-

The TL Press Council was established two years ago with seven directors (two appointed by the government but possibly for the last time), mostly veteran newsmen.

Solid funding
It has solid funding sourced from the Timor-Leste government, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), New Zealand, Japan and the Netherlands (but not Australia).

The council has 38 full time staff including media monitors, trainers, IT and a transport team with nine cars and 21 motorbikes in well-equipped premises (50 PCs) opposite Dili University.

The government has no influence over its operations and has enshrined freedom of speech in its national constitution.

The council runs regular monthly training and certification of graduates, backed by UNDP, for young reporters and students in all formats of print, TV and the most popular medium radio.

One objective is to become an avenue for resolution of media complaints instead of costly legal action, similar to Australia’s Press Council and New Zealand’s Media Council.

Current campaigns include lobbying Google to include Tetum, one official language alongside Portuguese, and seeking assistance from Facebook to include Tetum-speaking content monitors to quickly react to reported offensive posts, a major issue in the country’s recent elections.

Next year it is hoped countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Samoa, Solomon islands and Vanuatu will attend the Dili Dialogue.

The next forum will be held on May 9-10 next year.

Bob Howarth, a media consultant and correspondent for Reporters Without Borders, was a delegate at the Dili Dialogue Forum and is a regular contributor to Pacific Media Watch.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A Danish diver involved in the mission to successfully save 12 boys and their football coach from flooded Tham Luang cave in Thailand has hailed the children as “incredibly strong”, reports the Bangkok Post.

Ivan Karadzic, who runs a Thai diving business, described their treacherous escape journey as unprecedented.

“They [are being] forced to do something that no kid has ever done before. It is not in any way normal for kids to go cave diving at age 11,” he said Ivan Karadzic.

“They are diving in something considered [an] extremely hazardous environment in zero visibility. The only light that is in there is the torch light we bring ourself,” he told the BBC in an interview.

The boys, aged from 11 to 16, and their 25-year-old coach, ventured into Tham Luang cave in Chiang Rai’s Mae Sai district on June 23.

They became trapped when heavy rains flooded the cave. Two British divers found them on July 2 on a slope in pitch darkness 4km inside the cave.

More than 100 divers have helped with the extraction. Conditions were so dangerous a retired Thai Navy Seal died on Friday while trying to lay out oxygen tanks underwater in a tunnel, and the rescue chief at one point dubbed the operation “Mission Impossible”.

-Partners-

Oxygen tanks
Karadzic, who was stationed about half-way along to replace oxygen tanks, said the rescue workers had feared the worst.

“We were obviously very afraid of any kind of panic from the divers,” Karadzic said.

“I cannot understand how cool these small kids are, you know?

“Thinking about how they’ve been kept in a small cave for two weeks, they haven’t seen their mums. Incredibly strong kids. Unbelieva­ble, almost,” he added.

The chief of the Tham Luang mission officially announced last night that the rescue of all 13 people trapped in the cave had been accomplished and the restoration of the area would follow.

Rescue operation chief Narongsak Osotthanakorn told a media conference at the Pong Pha Tambon administration organisation near Tham Luang cave that the last group of five trapped people had been extracted.

A doctor and three divers who had been with the 13 people since their discovery had also already reached the main entrance of the cave.

All rescued … the Thai boy cavers. Image: Bangkok Post

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

By David Robie in Paris

When Reporters Without Borders chief Christophe Deloire introduced the Paris-based global media watchdog’s Asia-Pacific press freedom defenders to his overview last week, it was grim listening.

First up in RSF’s catalogue of crimes and threats against the global media was Czech President Miloš Zeman’s macabre press conference stunt late last year.

However, Zeman’s sick joke angered the media when he brandished a dummy Kalashnikov AK47 with the words “for journalists” carved into the wood stock at the October press   conference in Prague and with a bottle of alcohol attached instead of an ammunition clip.

Zeman has never been cosy with journalists but this gun stunt and a recent threat about “liquidating” journalists (another joke?) rank him alongside US President Donald Trump and the Philippines leader, Rodrigo Duterte, for their alleged hate speech against the media.

Deloire cited the Zeman incident to highlight global and Asia-Pacific political threats against the media. He pointed out that the threat came just a week after leading Maltese investigative journalist – widely dubbed as the “one-woman Wikileaks” – was killed in a car bomb blast.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was assassinated outside her home in Bidnija on 16 October 2017 after exposing Maltese links in the Panama Papers and her relentless corruption inquiries implicated her country’s prime minister and other key politicians.

Although arrests have been made and three men face trial for her killing, RSF recently published a statement calling for “full justice’ – including prosecution of those behind the murder.

Harshly critical
While noting the positive response by UN Secretary-General António Guterres to the journalists’ safety initiative by RSF and other media freedom bodies, Deloire was harshly critical of many political leaders, including Philippines President Duterte, over their attitude towards crimes with impunity against journalists.

In the Philippines, for example, there is still no justice for the 32 journalists brutally slain – along with 26 other victims – on 23 November 2009 by a local warlord’s militia in to so-called Ampatuan massacre, an unsuccessful bid to retain political power for their boss in national elections due the following year.

Rappler published a report last year updating the painfully slow progress in the investigations and concluded that “eight years and three presidential administrations later, no convictions have been made”.

Ironically, Rappler itself – hated by President Dutertre – has also been the subject of an RSF campaign in an effort to block the administration’s cynical and ruthless attempt to close down the most dynamic and successful online publication in the Philippines (133rd in the RSF World Media Freedom Index – a drop of six places).

Founded by ex-CNN investigative journalist Maria Ressa, Rappler has continued to challenge the government, described by RSF last year as the “most dangerous” country for journalists in Asia.

Duterte’s continuous attacks against the media were primarily responsible for the downward trend for the Philippines in the latest RSF Index, with RSF saying: “The dynamism of the media has also been checked by athe emergence of a leader who wants to show he is all powerful.”

The media watchdog also stressed that the Duterte administration had “developed several methods for pressuring and silencing journalists who criticise his notorious war on drugs”.

Test case
The revocation of Rappler’s licence by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is regarded as a test case for media freedom in the Philippines.

National Union of Journalists of the Philippines advocate Jhoanna Ballaran says the situation is very worrying.

The RSF consultation with some of its Asia-Pacific researchers and advocates in the field has followed a similar successful one in South America. It is believed that this is the first time the watchdog has hosted such an Asia Pacific-wide event.

Twenty three correspondents from 17 countries or territories — Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Hongkong, Maldives, Mongolia, Nepal, New Zealand, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Tibet — took part in the consultation plus a team of Paris-based RSF advocates.

Asia Pacific director Daniel Bastard says the consultation is part of a new strategy making better use of the correspondents’ network to make the impact of the advocacy work faster and even more effective than in the past.

The Pacific delegation – Associate Professor Joseph Fernandez, a journalist and media law academic who is head oif journalism at Curtin University of Australia (19th on the RSF Index), AUT Pacific Media Centre director Professor David Robie of New Zealand (8th) and former PNG Post-Courier chief executive and media consultant Bob Howarth of Papua New Guinea (53rd) – made lively interventions even though most media freedom issues “pale into insignificance” compared with many countries in the region where journalists are regularly killed or persecuted.

Nauru’s controversial ban on the ABC from covering the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) this September was soundly condemned and the draconian 2010 Media Industry Development Decree in Fiji (57th) and efforts by Pacific governments to introduce the repressive “China model” to curb the independence of Facebook and other social media were also strongly criticised. (Nauru is unranked and China is 176th, four places above the worst country – North Korea at 180th).

Media highlights
Highlights of the three-day consultation included a visit to the multimedia Agence France-Presse, one of the world’s “big two” news agencies, and workshops on online security and sources protection and gender issues.

No sooner had the consultation ended when RSF was on the ball with another protest over two detained local journalists in Myanmar working for Reuters news agency.

An RSF statement condemned Monday’s decision by a Yangon judge to go ahead with the trial of the journalists on a trumped up charge of possessing secrets and again demanded their immediate release.

Wa Lone, 32, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, have already been detained for more than 200 days with months of preliminary hearings.

They now face a possible 14-year prison sentence for investigating an army massacre of Rohingya civilians in Inn Din, a village near the Bangladeshi border in Rakhine state, in September 2017.

RSF secretary-general Deloire says: “The refusal to dismiss the case against the journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo is indicative of a judicial system that follows orders and a failed transition to democracy in Myanmar.”

The chances of seeing an independent press emerge in Myanmar have now “declined significantly”.

The Pacific Media Centre’s David Robie was in Paris for the Reporters Without Borders Asia-Pacific consultation. Dr Robie is also convenor of PMC’s Pacific Media Watch freedom project.

Czech President Miloš Zeman’s “joke” threat against journalists. Video: The Young Turks

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Former slaves head for home: Thousands of fishermen rescued from brutal conditions on foreign fishing boats make the journey back home, many after years at sea. As reported by Associated Press in September 2015. Video: AP on YouTube

By Jewel Topsfield of The Sydney Morning Herald in Jakarta

It’s hard to comprehend it happened in this century: human slaves trapped on fishing boats being whipped with poisonous stingray tails, having ice blocks thrown at them and being shot.

“If Americans and Europeans are eating this fish, they should remember us,” says Hlaing Min, 30, a runaway slave from Benjina, a remote fisheries weight station in eastern Indonesia’s Aru Islands.

“There must be a mountain of bones under the sea…. The bones of the people could be an island, it’s that many.”

In 2015 more than 1300 foreign fisherman from Myanmar, Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos were rescued from Benjina and Ambon, after an Associated Press investigation revealed the brutal conditions aboard many foreign vessels reflagged to operate in Indonesian waters.

Extraordinary images of men being kept in a cage exposed the chilling reality of 21st century slavery.

“They were trafficked from their home country, mostly by means of deception, forced to work over 20 hours per day on a boat in the middle of the sea, with little to no chance of escape,” says a report on human trafficking in the Indonesian fishing industry released this week.

Some were kept at sea for years at a time.

After the rescue, the International Organisation for Migration interviewed the fishers.

They were told of excessive work hours — 78 percent of 285 victims interviewed in depth claimed they worked between 16 and 24 hours a day, cramped conditions, meals of watery fish gruel, physical and psychological abuse and even murder.

‘Several crews died’
“While on board, I often heard the news from the boat radio that several boat crews had died, either falling to the ocean, fighting or killed by the other crews,” a Cambodian fisher says in the report.

“While I was working on the boat, I saw with my own eyes more than seven dead bodies floating in the sea.”

Witnesses testified that requesting to leave the boat could be a death sentence for some victims. Those who did might find themselves chained on the deck in the middle of the day or locked in the freezer.

“The heartrending stories of these fishers could not be left untold,” says IOM Indonesia’s chief of mission Mark Getchell.

The report says the Benjina and Ambon cases highlight the lack of adequate policing of the fishing industry and a lack of scrutiny of working conditions on ships and in fish processing plants.

Seafood caught by modern day slaves entered the global supply chain, with legitimate suppliers of fish “unaware of its provenance and the human toll behind the catch.”

“The situation in Benjina and Ambon is symptomatic of a much broader and insidious trade in people, not only in the Indonesian and Thai fishing industries, but indeed globally,” the report says.

Repatriation of enslaved fisherfmen
In 2015 the Australian government provided $2.17 million to IOM to support the daily care, repatriation and reintegration of formerly trafficked and enslaved fishermen from Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos, who had been stranded on islands in Indonesia’s Maluku province.

“This funding support has since been extended to enable IOM to provide assistance to foreign fishermen stranded in any area of Indonesia,” an Immigration Department spokesman said.

“This assistance plays a crucial role to support and protect victims of trafficking and slavery in the fishing industry by reuniting victims with their families and providing them with limited financial assistance which can help them establish an alternative livelihood.”

IOM spokesman Paul Dillon said Australia provided the lion share of the funding for its emergency response to the human trafficking crisis, which included returning more than 1000 victims to their home countries.

“This would not have been possible without the Australian government,” he said.

At the launch of the report in Jakarta this week, Indonesian Minister of Marine Affairs and Fisheries Susi Pudjiastuti unveiled a new government decree requiring all fisheries companies to submit a detailed human rights audit.

This was one of the report’s key recommendations to protect fishermen and port workers from abuse.

“That being said, Indonesia still has homework towards the approximately 250,000 Indonesian crews on foreign vessels operating across continents that remain unprotected,” Pudjiastuti says in a foreword to the report.

The report also called for greater diligence in recording the movement of vessels in Indonesian waters, more training on human trafficking, independent inspections of ports and vessels at sea and centres in ports where fishers could seek protection.

Jewel Topsfield is the Jakarta-based Indonesia correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald.This article was first published by the SMH and has been republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.

By Abdul Qowi Bastian

Sri Bintang Pamungkas was arrested in his home in Cibubur, in the outskirts of Indonesia’s capital Jakarta, on early Friday morning, December 2.

The civil society leader of People Power Indonesia 2016 – a group that aims to repeal the constitution before it is amended – was supposed to join the rally against Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama later that day.

Ahok, an ethnic Chinese-Christian politician, a double minority in the world’s most populous Muslim nation, is accused by conservative Muslim groups of committing blasphemy.

Pamungkas and 9 others were accused of attempting to impeach the current government led by President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo.

Among them are high profile individuals including rock musician Ahmad Dhani; human rights activist Ratna Sarumpaet; retired two-star Army general Kivlan Zein; and Rachmawati Soekarnoputri, sister of former president Megawati. They were arrested on treason charges under Article 107 of the penal code (KUHP).

The mobile phone video of the arrest Sri Bintang Pamungkas, filmed by his wife.

In a short video circulating on social media, Pamungkas was enjoying his cup of morning coffee on his porch when police officers handed him the warrant.

“Honey, I’m being arrested,” Pamungkas said to his wife who recorded the video on her mobile phone.

“Why?” his wife, Ernalia, was heard saying from behind the camera.

“They have the power to. Of course they can,” Pamungkas replied.

Pamungkas and People Power originally planned to occupy the parliament building, asking the council to revoke Jokowi’s presidency for, according to him, the former Jakarta governor’s inadequacy to follow the “people’s mandate”.

Seven people were released later that day because the police did not have sufficient evidence. Pamungkas in still in detention, along with two others who are still behind bars for allegedly insulting the President on social media, and violating the Internet Transaction Law.

Racial undertones
The December 2 rally was the third in a series of protests demanding Ahok to step down from his post as governor, for his remarks that allegedly insulted Islam.

The controversy started in September 2016 when he accused his opponents of fooling the electorate by misusing a Quranic verse, to sway voters to not vote for him in the upcoming gubernatorial election.

He has apologised for the remarks but is still being prosecuted for blasphemy.

Ahok is now a suspect and faces his first trial hearing next Tuesday. If proven guilty he could be jailed for up to 5 years.

But the issue has since spiraled to include other aspects. Critics have since accused the President —who was inaugurated two years ago—  of being inadequate to manage the country. Ahok became governor after Jokowi won the presidential election in 2014. As Jokowi’s deputy governor at the time, Ahok assumed the position.

Ahok himself is an outlier in the Indonesian political landscape. He was the former regent of Belitung Timur, a small region in Sumatera island, and was also a member of parliament before running as Jokowi’s deputy – but has always been considered as the “outsider” who came to the capital.

‘Crush the Chinese’
During the 200,000-people-strong rally on 2 December, some posters read, “Jail Ahok” and “Crush the Chinese”.

The race card used against Ahok is not new within Indonesia’s politics. It is deeply rooted in the New Order regime under former general Soeharto’s authoritarian regime. President Soeharto —who ruled Indonesia for more than 3 decades— banned expressions of Chinese culture and politically segregated the Chinese, because of suspected ties to communism.

Rally organisers and protestors used the Islam card which is an appealing pull for Indonesian Muslim voters.

One of Ahok’s opponents in next year’s elections, Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono, is the son of former President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono who led the country from 2004-2014.

Conservative Islamist groups such as the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) —one of the main rally organizers— have on social media openly supported Yudhoyono’s gubernatorial candidacy.

Shrinking civic spaces
Social media users in Indonesia are divided on the arrests. Some applaud the police force for attempting to prevent an impeachment attempt, while others see it as a violation of human rights.

“There seems to be no clear grounds for the arrest of these people,” said Benny Agus Prima, Human Rights Defender Programme Associate at the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA).

Prima stressed that the government must protect its people’s rights to express their freedom of expression.

“The rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly are constitutional rights and guaranteed by international human rights law,” he said. “Exercising those rights is a foundation of democratic society.”

The freedom to associate and to assemble, to express written and and oral opinions in Indonesia, are regulated under Article 28 of the 1945 constitution.

If proven guilty, those arrested could be jailed for 15 years up to a life sentence.

Prima regretted the detention of the individuals, which he said was a sign of the shrinking civic space, not only in the country but also in the region as well.

Case4Space
Civic space is where people can freely exercise their basic civil rights, such as freedom of expression and freedom of assembly and association. This kind of problem is not unique to Indonesia.

During the 3-day conference entitled “Youth at the heart of the 2030 Agenda: The Case4Space” held in Bangkok, Thailand, panelists shared how there are 3.2 billion people living in countries where civic space is under threat.

“We’re seeing a trend of shrinking civic space in Asia Pacific with recent examples of the criminalization of activists,” Prima said, citing an example of Maria Chin Abdullah of Malaysia.

Abdullah is the leader of the Malaysian pro-democracy alliance Bersih, who was detained in November 2016 for organizing a mass rally calling on Prime Minister Najib Razak to resign over a corruption scandal.

But in the end, according to Prima, what Pamungkas and his peers did was still in accordance to the law. “They demanded the parliament to review Widodo’s presidency, not bearing arms asking [him] to step down,” Prima said.

The arrests, he said, should not have taken place in the first place as it would take Indonesia —a country who adopted democracy 16 years ago— back to autocratic state.

Rozinul Aqli, an Indonesian student at the American University in Cairo, Egypt, also voiced his disapproval in Twitter, saying, “[Widodo] is increasingly becoming more comfortable in borrowing a page from Soeharto’s playbook”.

“Ideally, there should be clear violent acts for something to deserve the label of treason,” Rozinul said in an email to Rappler.

“In practice, however, this article [Article 107 of the penal code] has been used to criminalize many activists that were not, strictly speaking, threatening national security,” he said.

Freedom of expression at risk
Prima further said this case would set a bad precedent for human rights defenders.

“What I fear the most is, this criminalisation will restrict human rights defenders’ freedom of expression,” he said.

Although he also noted that the people who were arrested should respect Ahok’s freedom expression as well.

“When we’re talking about freedom of expression, we should respect others’ freedom to express their thoughts as well,” Prima said. “We can’t force those who, let’s say, commit human rights violations by also violating others’ human rights.”

Rozinul added that rubber articles, such as Article 107 of the penal code, are problematic as they deprive citizens the right to legal certainty.

“If some of us are alarmed by this development, it is because we know that using rubber articles to silence dissents was one of the cornerstones of the New Order regime,” he said.

Abdul Qowi Bastian is a staff editor for Rappler based in Bangkok.