Thailand’s lèse-majesté taboo leading to witch-hunt – Asia Sentinel
December 7th, 2011
http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4020&Itemid=392
Caption - Rossamarin Tangnoppakul holds photo of husband Ampon with grandchildren (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
BANGKOK - Thailand’s growing curbs on freedom of speech have seen a grandfather sentenced to twenty years in jail for insulting the country’s monarchy, while a U.S citizen awaits a possible similar fate in a ruling due tomorrow.
Last month Ampon Tangnoppakul, 61 was sentenced to 20 years in prison on charges of insulting Queen Sirikit in four sms texts sent to an official working for Thailand’s former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejajjiva.
Ampon’s crestfallen wife Rossamarin spoke to Asia Sentinel on Monday in a coffee shop near her home in Samut Prakarn in eastern Bangkok. Her jailed husband, she said, “is still very stressed by everything and gets sick often.”
In court last month, Ampon claimed innocence and his family insist that he does not even know how to send mobile phone text messages. (more…)
EU judge recommends removal of sanctions on Tay Za’s son – The Irrawaddy
December 4th, 2011
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22594
HO CHI MINH CITY – Pye Phyo Tay Za, the 25-year-old son of Burmese businessman Tay Za, could be set to win an appeal against the EU sanctions imposed on him at the European Court of Justice.
A Nov. 29 opinion by a Court Advocate-General said that the previous May 2010 judgment upholding sanctions on Pye Phyo should be reversed, and that the European Commission as well as the United Kingdom should bear legal costs, as the losing parties in the case. The assessment stated that the Court’s original ruling “gave an excessively broad interpretation of those articles (that allowed sanctions on Pye Phyo) and erred in law.”
Vietnam’s Problems, Promises – Asia Sentinel/RTÉ World Report
December 2nd, 2011
http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4003&Itemid=214
radio report here - http://www.rte.ie/news/player.html?worldreport#programme=World%20Report
Lu Van Thinh at his bamboo farm in Thanh Hoa province (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
Continuing growth is exceeded by stubborn inflation
HO CHI MINH CITY- With average per capital annual incomes of just over US$1,000, Vietnam is officially a lower-middle income country, and in Hanoi, the seat of government, and commercial capital Ho Chi Minh City – still popularly known as Saigon – property prices are on an upward curve and new building and property developments appear shoot up faster than new growth in Vietnam’s lush tropical rainforests.
The appearance is somewhat illusory. The country faces crushing inflation, forecast by Standard Chartered Bank at 19.7 percent in December, with an11.3 percent rise forecast for 2012. The dong is expected to continue to depreciate throughout the year given Vietnam’s US$8 billion current account deficit and low foreign currency reserves. (more…)
DMZ: Road trip to the world’s most heavily armed border – CNNGo
December 2nd, 2011
http://www.cnngo.com/seoul/visit/dmz-seoul-road-trip-357435
Tourists get an earful from South Korean soldier after pointing cameras the wrong way in the DMZ (Photo: Simon Roughneen
A spin north to the DMZ is almost a rite-of-passage for any visitor to Seoul, but it’s best to go there with an insight into life across the line.
SEOUL – As the tour bus moves from central Seoul to the city outskirts, the seamless transition from one of the world’s biggest and most vibrant cities to the world’s most heavily armed border is as surreal as it is functional, with roadside bus-stops giving way to military watchtowers even as the city’s sun-glazed heights shimmer and recede into the background.
“Many South Koreans don’t think so much about the North”, opined *So Yeon, a North Korean defector now working for the Seoul-based Panmunjom Travel Centre. Every morning she addresses a busload of tourists about her escape from North Korea , telling her story while en route to the demilitarized zone (DMZ), a 2.5 mile wide bufferzone running the length of the 160-mile North-South border. (more…)
Burma’s Vietnam moment? – Christian Science Monitor
December 1st, 2011
At work inside a clothing factory in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM – A pivotal moment may have arrived for Burma (Myanmar), with the arrival on Wednesday of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the first time in over a half-century that such a senior American official has visited the country.
After her meeting on Thursday afternoon with Burma’s President Thein Sein, Secretary Clinton announced that the US is ready to improve relations and even indicated it could ease sanctions with Burma’s quasi-civilian government if the country continues with recent reforms. “These are beginning steps, and we are prepared to go further if reforms maintain momentum,” she said. (more…)
Ireland pushes education ties with Vietnam in bid to court student market – Irish Independent
November 28th, 2011
Ireland's Minister of State for Trade and Development Jan O'Sullivan and Vietnam's Minister of Education and Training Pham Vu Luan sign education MOU in Hanoi on Monday (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
Simon Roughneen in Hanoi – Ireland and Vietnam today launched a deal aimed at increasing the number of Vietnamese students taking third-level courses in Ireland.
Speaking in the Vietnamese capital on Monday morning, Minister of State for Trade And Development Jan O’Sullivan said that “Ireland sees our education linkages as central to the future of bilateral economic relations with Vietnam.”
Currently 40 Vietnamese are enrolled in Ireland’s universities, mostly funded by Irish Government scholarships. To compare, 6000 Vietnamese are studying in the UK, and elsewhere, tapping the Asian student market has created a multi-billion dollar industry within Australia’s third-level education system. Last year 25,000 Vietnamese were part of a total of 240,000 Asian students who enrolled in Australia, up from 180,000 in 2008. (more…)
Keeping up with the neighbours: Thailand jails grandfather for 20 years – The Huffington Post
November 24th, 2011
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/simon-roughneen/thailand-hails-grandfather_b_1111483.html
In a sentence exceeding some those handed down for murder and rape in the country, Thailand yesterday jailed a man for 20 years, for no more than sending 4 text messages allegedly insulting the country’s Queen.
The evidence against Ampon Tangnoppakul seemed inconclusive, and the sentence handed down has been slammed by freedom-of-speech advocates as vastly-disproportionate to an offence which – at most – might result in a defamation suit in other jurisdictions.
However even that might be in doubt, given that it cannot be assessed whether or not the messages insult anyone, as the the content of the messages has not been revealed. To do so – even in court -could in itself be deemed an act of lèse majesté , an additional absurdity to Thailand’s laws on this matter and related computer crimes legislation, which allow any person to lodge a complaint about another who they regard as insulting the country’s monarchy. (more…)
Deported migrants await January plan to return to Thailand – The Irrawaddy
November 24th, 2011
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22531
Migrants face dangerous journey as Napyidaw contemplates longer-term ‘Filipino-style’ overseas worker strategy
BANGKOK – Tens of thousands of Burmese migrants who fled Thailand’s floods are in danger of trafficking and extortion unless both Thailand and Burma’s Governments come up with a plan to facilitate a safe return, say activists.
From September-November 2011, almost 100,000 Burmese migrant workers returned to their homeland via Mae Sot, a town on the Thailand-Burma border that serves as the main land connection between the two countries. However tens of thousands of these migrants were deported from Thailand after homes and workplaces were flooded in the recent disaster, which left over 600 people dead in Thailand.
According to data from the Mae Sot immigration office, 39,841 of the returnees held temporary passports – meaning that they could legally cross back to Burma and can subsequently return to Thailand to resume work at their flooded employment locations. (more…)
Clinton must maintain pressure on Burmese Government – The Irrawaddy
November 22nd, 2011
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22510
Political prisoner release and an end to attacks on civilians in ethnic minority areas should be U.S. Sec. Of State’s priority in Burma.
BANGKOK – Burmese opposition figures and analysts hope that the upcoming visit by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Burma will boost reforms in the country, but caution that the Burmese Government continues to violate human rights despite some positive recent signals
Speaking by telephone from Rangoon, National League for Democracy (NLD) spokesperson Ohn Kyaing said that “We welcome Secretary Clinton’s visit, as we hope she can address the Government to release political prisoners, give human rights to our people and to stop fighting in the ethnic regions”. (more…)
US-China rivalry to dominate Bali summit as Clinton gets set for Burma – The Irrawaddy
November 18th, 2011
http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=22489
BANGKOK—The weekend’s Asia-Pacific summits in Bali will be dominated by a growing US-China rivalry, part of which revolves around Burma, with Hillary Clinton set to visit the country next month.
Burma’s Government has been granted its wish to hold the Association of Southeast Nations (Asean) chair in 2014, two years ahead of schedule and one year before the country’s next elections, due in 2015. This step-by-step rehabilitation continued today, with US President Obama announcing that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit Burma next month. (more…)
