The excessive and disproportionate restrictions imposed during the Covid-19 pandemic have compounded the effects of decades of the North Korean government’s violations of the rights to food, health, and to an adequate standard of living; and to freedom of expression and movement, according to Human Rights Watch....
A new report from the Korean Institute for National Unification (KINU) provides eyewitness testimony that the Kim regime publicly executed violators of Pyongyang’s draconian COVID-19 quarantine measures.
Reports of shoot-to-kill orders for anyone attempting to cross the North Korean border during the pandemic were previously covered by NKNews in October 2020, but new testimony in the KINU report grants further credence to these dark realities.
Public executions have long been a feature of the Kim regime’s policies – ranging from public executions of Christians for being caught with a Bible to the purging of Pyongyang’s elites to tamp down on any semblance of revolutionary spirit. A 2019 report from the Transitional Justice Working Group put a finer point on the matter – of the 600 defectors interviewed, they documented “323 reports of sites of state-sanctioned killings”. According to the same report, 83 percent of North Koreans surveyed said they witnessed a public execution.
In recent years, China’s LGBTQ+ community has been swept up in the Chinese Communist party’s broader crackdown on civil society and freedom of expression. In May 2023, a well known LGBTQ+ advocacy group in Beijing announced it was closing due to “unavoidable” circumstances. Last February, two university students filed a...
The 15-year-old Beijing LGBT Center, one of the pioneers of the “different sexual orientation movement” in China, announced this week that it had terminated its operations without explanation.
Analysts said the closure of the well-known rights center was seen as inevitable and a reflection of the increasingly repressive political environment in China under Xi Jinping.
[…] In 2019, Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan passed the Special Act on Same-Sex Marriage, becoming the first country in Asia to allow same-sex marriage, but the regulations stipulated that married same-sex couples could adopt only children biologically related to one of the partners […] Taiwan is now leading Asia in same-sex marriage legislation.
The evidence suggests LGBTQ+ activists in China have had a particularly tough time since President Xi Jinping took office in 2013. The effects of targeting have spiralled in the past few years, reflected in the abrupt closure of the Shanghai Pride in 2020, and the 2021 shutdown of LGBT Rights Advocacy China – an organisation that held law-based campaigns.
The girls – who were detained in shopping centres, classes and street markets – were accused of “spreading and encouraging others to wear a bad hijab” and wearing makeup....
This was only one incident, and hopefully it won’t be repeated elsewhere.
Such incidents happen often in Afghanistan, and mostly against women. The central government bans girls from education, just to name another example.
There is another article by CBS quoting representatives of the central government:
Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban regime’s chief spokesperson, confirmed the arrests to CBS News on Monday, saying “a group of women who were involved in modeling to promote clothes were detained, advised in front of their family members […]
The person said that after several hours of searching [for a woman detained by the Taliban], the family found the woman at a local police station late Tuesday evening, where Taliban officials demanded money, along with her passport and other documentation, as a penalty and “to guarantee that she will not violate the dress code in the future.”
The family member said the authorities told the family they would “take her biometrics and photos, and if she violates the dress code in the future, she will be imprisoned for a longer period.”
Recent arrests of women in Kabul Afghanistan for ‘bad hijab’, confirmed by the Taliban, regrettably signified further restrictions on women’s freedom of expression and undermines other rights,” [United Nations special envoy for Afghanistan] Bennett said in a social media post.
Gangs are running profitable businesses inside the correctional facilities, and even have the keys to their own units. Recent rioting showed the extent of their power, posing a difficult challenge for the government of Daniel Noboa.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, whose real power derives from his position as the head of the ruling Communist Party, has placed more emphasis on quality over quantity. He has demanded absolute loyalty from party members, launched an ideology drive to shore up their faith, and unleashed a crackdown on internal dissent. Members are bound by more stringent rules – and millions of cadres have been investigated for violating them in the past nine years since Xi took control of the party.
Regarding the ‘1984 social credit system’ there are a lot of good resources which tell a story far diffrrent from yours. One recent example is tbe documentary ‘Total Trust’ by Chinese film maker Zhang Jialing. The film’s introduction says:
Total Trust is an eye-opening and deeply disturbing story of surveillance technology, abuse of power and (self-)censorship that confronts us with what can happen when our privacy is ignored. Through the haunting stories of people in China who have been monitored, intimidated and even tortured, the film tells of the dangers of technology in the hands of unbridled power.
Watch the film. There are many reviews about it (and other sources about surveillance in China). It’s really easy to find on the web.
I think this law has similar intentions.
Addition: <a href="">@megopie</a> it would be great if you could post a source of what you say. Thanks in advance.
Dr. Wenliang’s message went viral, becoming the earliest warning of what we now know today as Covid-19. He returned to work, but contracted Covid from a patient, and died on February 7, 2020....
This month the Weibo account Weibo Finance, which has more than 1.5 million followers, issued an instruction against posting any comments “that bad-mouth the economy”. The post appears to have since been deleted. Bloomberg reported that several other finance influencers had been told by Weibo to “avoid crossing red...
The official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) likely was at 49.5 in December from last month’s 49.4, according to the median forecast of 24 economists in a poll conducted Dec 22-28. The 50-point mark separates growth from contraction.
Nearly 90% of the foreign investment inflows into Chinese equity markets in 2023 has been withdrawn as sentiment crumbles and investors losing confidence in major Chinese institutions....
To provide context to the article: There is a proven dynamic relationship between trade openness, foreign direct investment, and industrial economic growth within economies, and this is true also for China. There is strong evidence for this (for example, see here).
A significant portion of China’s GDP depends on foreign direct investments, and the Gini coefficient, a metric for economic inequity, is 0.45 in China (for comparison, in most European countries it is between 0.3 and 0.35). It is commonly said that any Gini above 0.4 bears a high risk for social unrest.
I don’t know how whataboutism helps China or anyone else, but there are several countries with high degrees of inequality. You should also provide a source for your data. Gini coefficient for US
This is a sign how powerful Navalny still is in Putin’s imagination even from his prison cell. Everything seems done for Putin’s victory in the upcoming election in March, all opposition eliminated, but he still fears the ‘dissident’ so much to locate him at the edge of the Arctic Circle.
Tortured in huge internment camps, forced labour and mass sterilisations: The Chinese state’s attack on the Uyghur people, an ethnic minority in western China, is akin to genocide, with an estimated one million people arbitrarily detained. An in-depth look at how Beijing has committed grave human rights offences over decades....
It has been reported that more than one million ethnic minorities have been killed, arrested and forced into detention camps/prisons, what is referred to in Beijing as “re-education camps”, like the one witnessed during the Cultural Revolution. In reality, minority people are subjected to humiliation, torture and political indoctrination in these so-called camps to make them “de-radicalised”. China claims this to be an effective way of “tacking extremism”, whereby, once de-radicalised, these people would acquire skills to be employable and contribute to the economy. The mass internment system has affected not only those subjected to the state crackdown but also the family members of those incarcerated, especially children.
Samira was a child bride married at 15 and a victim of domestic violence. She had two young children, one a new-born baby, when she was arrested and had not seen her children in ten years. She saw them for the first and last time when they came to the prison to say goodbye....
I don’t want to disturb the thread here about religion, islam, and the like, but the point here is that a young girl was forced into a marriage at the age of 15, then raped and beaten by her ‘husband’, and then hanged by an autocratic regime because she obviously found no other way out of the horror. The Iranian regime is in charge of that, the people responsible are to be held accountable, rather than any religion, ideology, or the like.
It’s not because we hate them for their religion (for the saner part of Europeans it’s the same bullshit as Christianity)
Yes, I am firmly convinced that religion (and ideology) is used as a pretext for suppresssing people. One of Iran’s major partner countries is China, for example, but Iran says nothing about Beijing’s oppression of the Muslim Uyghur minority in China. They don’t care.
It’s all about power, and we see similar things all around the globe across all cultures and ages, including here in Europe.
There is ample evidence that China is suppressing its own people, including prohibiting emigration. One good source among many is the Safeguard Defenders, an NGO focusing on China.
You’ll find many good sources, including here on Lemmy. The situation has even been getting worse in recent years.
<a href="">@Bartsbigbugbag </a>What’s a good source on that issue in your opinion? I know a lot more, but would like to learn new ones if possible. Would be great if you posted a link.
A court in New York has ruled that UC Global and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) violated the constitutional rights and privacy of U.S. citizens when they met with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at Ecuador’s embassy in London....
The announcement of what could be Julian Assange’s final hearings – on 20 and 21 February before the British High Court – has sparked a flurry of speculation about what could be the final fate of the now 52-year-old Australian journalist and publisher, who has been imprisoned in London for four years while awaiting extradition to the United States where 175 years of supermax almost certainly await him.
But how is it possible that Assange can be jailed for 175 years, just for doing what any responsible journalist and editor should always do – that is, disclose war crimes and other wrongdoings he or she learns about by way of spontaneous witnesses? Especially since the US Supreme Court ruled in 1971 that it is permissible to reveal state secrets if it is in the public interest to do so?
Nations like France, the United States, Canada, India, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Japan are planning maritime patrols with the Philippines to illustrate their opposition to China’s incursions in the West Philippine Sea.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday voiced concern over China’s aggression in the Taiwan Strait during a year-end news conference in Washington.
The US and its allies are “more closely aligned than ever” to face the challenges presented by Beijing, Blinken said.
North Korean government in 2023 continued to use the Covid-19 pandemic as a pretext to maintain “shoot on sight” orders on its northern border, rights group says (www.hrw.org)
The excessive and disproportionate restrictions imposed during the Covid-19 pandemic have compounded the effects of decades of the North Korean government’s violations of the rights to food, health, and to an adequate standard of living; and to freedom of expression and movement, according to Human Rights Watch....
‘It’s difficult to survive’: China’s LGBTQ+ advocates face jail and forced confession (www.theguardian.com)
In recent years, China’s LGBTQ+ community has been swept up in the Chinese Communist party’s broader crackdown on civil society and freedom of expression. In May 2023, a well known LGBTQ+ advocacy group in Beijing announced it was closing due to “unavoidable” circumstances. Last February, two university students filed a...
Taiwan’s vote is a crack in the new axis of autocracy - (Opinion) (www.afr.com)
Unpaywalled link: web.archive.org/…/taiwan-s-vote-is-a-crack-in-the…...
Afghan girls as young as 16 arrested in shops, classes and markets in Kabul by the Taliban, who labelled them ‘infidels’ for wearing ‘bad hijab’ (www.theguardian.com)
The girls – who were detained in shopping centres, classes and street markets – were accused of “spreading and encouraging others to wear a bad hijab” and wearing makeup....
Armed gang storms Ecuador TV station as state of ‘internal armed conflict’ declared (www.theguardian.com)
China feels the country isn’t patriotic enough. A new law aims to change that. (edition.cnn.com)
Cross-posted from: beehaw.org/post/10848936...
Today 4 years ago, Dr. Li Wenliang warned of a suspected SARS patient in a Wuhan WeChat group. Soon later, he was arrested for “making false comments on the Internet about unconfirmed SARS outbreak.” (harakahdaily.net)
Dr. Wenliang’s message went viral, becoming the earliest warning of what we now know today as Covid-19. He returned to work, but contracted Covid from a patient, and died on February 7, 2020....
China cracks down on negativity over economy in bid to boost confidence amid record high youth unemployment and struggling property sector (www.theguardian.com)
This month the Weibo account Weibo Finance, which has more than 1.5 million followers, issued an instruction against posting any comments “that bad-mouth the economy”. The post appears to have since been deleted. Bloomberg reported that several other finance influencers had been told by Weibo to “avoid crossing red...
The Great China Unwind: Foreign Investors Pull $29B Out Of Chinese Equity Markets In 2023 despite the People’s Bank's efforts at making China an attractive opportunity for foreign investment (markets.businessinsider.com)
Nearly 90% of the foreign investment inflows into Chinese equity markets in 2023 has been withdrawn as sentiment crumbles and investors losing confidence in major Chinese institutions....
Navalny Found in Arctic Prison After 3-Week Disappearance (www.themoscowtimes.com)
China's Uyghur Drama: Wiping Out An Entire Ethnic Minority --- [documentary in French with English subtitles, 105 min] (www.arte.tv)
Tortured in huge internment camps, forced labour and mass sterilisations: The Chinese state’s attack on the Uyghur people, an ethnic minority in western China, is akin to genocide, with an estimated one million people arbitrarily detained. An in-depth look at how Beijing has committed grave human rights offences over decades....
Iran, child bride and year-long victim of domestic violence Samira Sabzian who killed her 'husband' has been been executed in Ghezelhesar Prison (www.iranhr.net)
Samira was a child bride married at 15 and a victim of domestic violence. She had two young children, one a new-born baby, when she was arrested and had not seen her children in ten years. She saw them for the first and last time when they came to the prison to say goodbye....
Escaping Xi’s China by paddleboard: ‘I rushed into the water and thought if they catch me, they catch me’ (www.theguardian.com)
New York court: Spanish company and the CIA found guilty of violating rights of Julian Assange’s visitors (english.elpais.com)
A court in New York has ruled that UC Global and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) violated the constitutional rights and privacy of U.S. citizens when they met with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at Ecuador’s embassy in London....
China provocations worrisome but his country will not yield an inch of its territory to any foreign entity, Philippine President Marcos says (www.manilatimes.net)
Nations like France, the United States, Canada, India, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Japan are planning maritime patrols with the Philippines to illustrate their opposition to China’s incursions in the West Philippine Sea.
Israel-Palestine: injured patients ‘waiting to die’ in northern Gaza as last hospital shuts down, amid rising 'catastrophic' hunger levels, UN says (news.un.org)
Milei begins dismantling the Argentine State by imposing 300 reforms in a single decree (english.elpais.com)