MAUNGDAW, Myanmar: The transit camp in Myanmar’s Rakhine state stands ready to welcome back 150 Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh every day.
But on most days it lies completely empty, as members of the stateless minority dread returning to a place they were violently driven from by the military, and Myanmar makes little effort to reassure them things will be different this time.
“We have been ready to receive them since January, when we opened,” said Win Khaing, immigration director at Nga Khu Ra, standing in the desolate camp with reporters on Friday as part of a two-day government-chaperoned trip to the area.
The result is a stand-off, as Myanmar immigration officials wait in empty offices shuffling papers and arranging biometric equipment but with little to no work to do except greet visiting delegations and journalists.
Fewer than 200 Rohingya Muslims have been resettled in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state from the 700,000 who fled a violent army crackdown in August.
Rohingya women say they were raped by security forces, while witnesses described summary executions and a merciless campaign of violence that the UN has said amounts to ethnic cleansing.
Myanmar says it only targeted militants, although the military has admitted one instance of executing captured suspects.
Even the limited number of Rohingya who have returned have all done so under murky circumstances.
In April the government trumpeted the arrival of a Rohingya family of five, but it was later slammed as a PR stunt as it emerged they had come from a buffer area between the two countries that is technically part of Myanmar.
Local authorities nevertheless created a billboard with several large photos of the family near the border, heralding the “photo records of steps of repatriation.”
In recent months, Myanmar says dozens have been repatriated after crossing over from Bangladesh illegally.
It says others who tried to flee to Bangladesh by boat but accidentally washed up back in Myanmar have also been sent to live with relatives after being processed at the transit camp.
Bangladesh does not recognize these as legitimate returnees.
“The repatriation process has not begun,” Bangladesh refugee commissioner Mohammad Abul Kalam said.
Nine Rohingya purportedly released from prison in May after crossing back over illegally were brought by Myanmar officials to meet journalists on Friday.
But cracks quickly emerged in the story, with some saying they had never even been to Bangladesh and were “repatriated” from prison in Myanmar.
“We were arrested in November last year (in Myanmar) and sentenced to four years imprisonment each under the immigration act,” said Yar Sein, 35, a farmer and father-of-four.
“We were arrested from school and accused of coming from Bangladesh. We haven’t been to Bangladesh.”
The prolonged delays in repatriation have also strained relations with Bangladesh, which plans to send a protest note after a 10-year-old Rohingya boy in the buffer zone was struck by a bullet from the Myanmar side on Thursday.
Myanmar says it fired at people attempting to damage the border fence.
As the two countries blame each other for the delay, Myanmar has embarked on what it says is a massive development project in northern Rakhine, bulldozing Rohingya towns and remaking the entire landscape in the name of reconstruction.
The UN has said conditions in Rakhine are not ripe for a safe, voluntary and dignified repatriation, but signed an agreement with Myanmar to assess conditions on the ground to help refugees make an informed decision.
Myanmar has faced global condemnation for its treatment of the Rohingya, and Amnesty International said this week that several senior military figures should be tried for crimes against humanity.
A US Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report Thursday downgraded Myanmar for failing to protect Rohingya Muslims fleeing the crackdown and leaving them vulnerable to exploitation and trafficking rings.
The Rohingya are loathed by many in Myanmar, where they were stripped of citizenship and branded illegal immigrants from Bangladesh despite calling Rakhine their homeland.
Min Aung Hlaing, the army chief, said last month that Rohingya have nothing to fear as long as they stay in places “designated” for them, raising concerns that they would be placed back into the apartheid-like conditions they escaped.
Ye Htoo, district administrator in Maungdaw — the epicenter of violence in the western state — told reporters Myanmar is “planning to create a good environment for them to stay if they come back.”
Still, he admitted, “there is no one” at the camps.
Local residents have also spoken of not being willing to coexist alongside their former neighbors, whom many associate with a Rohingya militant group that attacked police posts.
Khin Soe, a 30-year-old Buddhist ethnic Rakhine woman from Inn Din village, said they are still afraid.
“If the government really plans to relocate them here again, we are leaving this place.”
Myanmar transit camps sit empty as Rohingya fear return
Myanmar transit camps sit empty as Rohingya fear return
- Fewer than 200 Rohingya Muslims have been resettled in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state from the 700,000 who fled a violent army crackdown in August
- Even the limited number of Rohingya who have returned have all done so under murky circumstances
EU needs to keep up dialogue with Israel, Dutch foreign minister says on Borrell proposal
- Disagreeing with the EU’s top diplomat who proposed to pause the dialogue with the country
PARIS: The European Union needs to continue its diplomatic dialogue with Israel amid tensions in the Middle East, Dutch foreign Caspar Veldkamp said on Monday, disagreeing with the EU’s top diplomat who proposed to pause the dialogue with the country.
European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell last week proposed that the bloc suspend its political dialogue with Israel, citing possible human rights violations in the war in Gaza, according to four diplomats and a letter seen by Reuters.
Pakistan’s top cleric says use of VPNs is against Islamic laws as the government seeks to ban them
- VPNs are legal in most countries, however they are outlawed or restricted in places where authorities control Internet access
- Million of Pakistanis have been unable to access the X social media platform since February 2023
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s top body of clerics has declared the use of virtual private networks, or VPNs, against Islamic laws, officials said Monday, as the Ministry of Interior sought a ban on the service that helps people evade censorship in countries with tight Internet controls.
Raghib Naeemi, the chairman of the Council of Islamic Ideology, which advises the government on religious issues, said that Shariah allows the government to prevent actions that lead to the “spread of evil.” He added that any platform used for posting content that is controversial, blasphemous, or against national integrity “should be stopped immediately.”
Million of Pakistanis have been unable to access the X social media platform since February 2023, when the government blocked it ahead of parliamentary elections, except via VPN — a service that hides online activity from anyone else on the Internet
Authorities say they are seeking to ban the use of VPNs to curb militancy. However, critics say the proposed ban is part of curbs on freedom of expression.
VPNs are legal in most countries, however they are outlawed or restricted in places where authorities control Internet access or carry out online surveillance and censorship.
Among users of VPNs in Pakistan are supporters of the country’s imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan, who have called for a march on Islamabad on Sunday to pressure the government for his release.
Pakistan often suspends mobile phone service during rallies of Khan’s supporters. But Naeemi’s weekend declaration that the use of VPNs is against Shariah has stunned many.
Naeemi’s edict came after the Ministry of Interior wrote a letter to the Ministry of Information and Technology asking for the VPN ban on the grounds that the service is being used by insurgents to propagate their agenda.
It said that “VPNs are increasingly being exploited by terrorists to facilitate violent activities.” The ministry also wants to deny access to “pornographic” and blasphemous content.
Last week, authorities had also asked the Internet users to register VPNs with Pakistan’s media regulator, a move which will allow increased surveillance on the users of Internet.
Pakistan is currently battling militants who have stepped up attacks in recent months.
On Friday, a separatist Baloch Liberation Army group attacked troops in Kalat, a district in Balochistan province, triggering an intense shootout in which seven soldiers and six insurgents were killed, according to police and the military. The BLA claimed the attack in a statement.
Masked men break into UK’s Windsor Castle estate
- Prince William and his family were believed to be at Adelaide Cottage, part of the Windsor Castle estate
LONDON: Two masked men broke into Britain’s royal Windsor Castle estate last month and stole two vehicles from a barn, the Sun newspaper reported on Monday.
King Charles and his wife Camilla were not in the estate at the time of the incident but Prince William and his family were believed to be at Adelaide Cottage, part of the Windsor Castle estate, the Sun reported.
The men used a stolen truck to break through a security gate at night and then scaled a six-foot fence, the paper said.
Local police said officers were called to a report of a burglary on Crown Estate land in Windsor, west of London, just before midnight on Oct. 13.
“Offenders entered a farm building and made off with a black Isuzu pick-up and a red quad bike. They then made off toward the Old Windsor/Datchet area,” Thames Valley Police told the newspaper. “No arrests have been made at this stage and an investigation is ongoing.”
Windsor Castle previously faced a security scare in 2021 when authorities arrested a man with a crossbow in the grounds of the castle who said he had wanted to kill Queen Elizabeth.
Disgraced Singapore oil tycoon sentenced to nearly 18 years for fraud
- Lim Oon Kuin was convicted in May in a case that dented the city-state’s reputation as a top Asian oil trading hub
- His firm was among Asia’s biggest oil trading companies before its sudden and dramatic collapse in 2020
SINGAPORE: The founder of a failed Singapore oil trading company was sentenced Monday to nearly 18 years in jail for cheating banking giant HSBC out of millions of dollars in one of the country’s most serious cases of fraud.
Lim Oon Kuin, 82, better known as O.K. Lim, was convicted in May in a case that dented the city-state’s reputation as a top Asian oil trading hub.
His firm, Hin Leong Trading, was among Asia’s biggest oil trading companies before its sudden and dramatic collapse in 2020.
Sentencing him to 17 and a half years in jail, State Courts judge Toh Han Li said he agreed with the prosecution that the offenses had the potential to undermine confidence in Singapore’s oil trading industry.
The amount involved “stood at the top-tier of cheating cases” in the city-state, a global financial hub, he said.
The judge shaved off a year due to Lim’s age but did not give any sentencing discount on account of his health, saying the Singapore Prison Service has adequate medical facilities.
Lim, however, remained free on bail after his lawyers said they would file an appeal before the High Court.
State prosecutors had sought a 20-year jail term, saying “this is one of the most serious cases of trade financing fraud that has ever been prosecuted in Singapore.”
The defense had argued for seven years imprisonment, playing down the harm caused by Lim’s offenses and citing his age and poor health.
The businessman faced a total of 130 criminal charges involving hundreds of millions of dollars, but prosecutors tried and convicted him on just three – two of cheating HSBC, and a third of encouraging a Hin Leong executive to forge documents.
Prosecutors said he tricked HSBC into disbursing nearly $112 million by telling the bank that his firm had entered into oil sales contracts with two companies.
The transactions were, in fact, “complete fabrications, concocted on the accused’s directions,” prosecutors said, adding that his actions “tarnished Singapore’s hard-earned reputation as Asia’s leading oil trading hub.”
Lim built Hin Leong from a single delivery truck shortly before Singapore became independent in 1965.
It grew into a major supplier of fuel used by ships, and its rise in some ways mirrored Singapore’s growth from a gritty port to an affluent financial hub.
The firm played a key role in helping the city-state become the world’s top ship refueling port, observers say, and it expanded into ship chartering and management with a subsidiary that has a fleet of more than 150 vessels.
But it came crashing down in 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic plunged oil markets into unprecedented turmoil, exposing Hin Leong’s financial troubles, and Lim sought court protection from creditors.
In a bombshell affidavit seen by AFP in 2020, Lim revealed the oil trader had “in truth... not been making profits in the last few years” – despite having officially reported a healthy balance sheet in 2019.
He admitted that the firm he founded after emigrating from China had hidden $800 million in losses over the years, while it also owed almost $4 billion to banks.
Lim took responsibility for ordering the company not to report the losses and confessed it had sold off inventories that were supposed to backstop loans.
Climate talks in Azerbaijan head into their second week, coinciding with G20 in Rio
- Talks in Baku are focused on getting more climate cash for developing countries to transition away from fossil fuels
- Several experts put the sum needed at around $1 trillion
BAKU: United Nations talks on getting money to curb and adapt to climate change resumed Monday with tempered hope that negotiators and ministers can work through disagreements and hammer out a deal after slow progress last week.
That hope comes from the arrival of the climate and environment ministers from around the world this week in Baku, Azerbaijan, for the COP29 talks. They’ll give their teams instructions on ways forward.
“We are in a difficult place,” said Melanie Robinson, economics and finance program director of global climate at the World Resources Institute. “The discussion has not yet moved to the political level — when it does I think ministers will do what they can to make a deal.”
Talks in Baku are focused on getting more climate cash for developing countries to transition away from fossil fuels, adapt to climate change and pay for damages caused by extreme weather. But countries are far apart on how much money that will require. Several experts put the sum needed at around $1 trillion.
“One trillion is going to look like a bargain five, 10 years from now,” said Rachel Cleetus from the Union of Concerned Scientists, citing a multitude of costly recent extreme weather events from flooding in Spain to hurricanes Helene and Milton in the United States. “We’re going to wonder why we didn’t take that and run with it.”
Meanwhile, the world’s biggest decision makers are halfway around the world as another major summit convenes. Brazil is hosting the Group of 20 summit, which runs Nov. 18-19, bringing together many of the world’s largest economies. Climate change — among other major topics like rising global tensions and poverty — will be on the agenda.
Harjeet Singh, global engagement director for the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, said G20 nations “cannot turn their backs on the reality of their historical emissions and the responsibility that comes with it.”
“They must commit to trillions in public finance,” he said.
In a written statement on Friday, United Nations Climate Change’s executive secretary Simon Stiell said “the global climate crisis should be order of business Number One” at the G20 meetings.
Stiell noted that progress on stopping more warming should happen both in and out of climate talks, calling the G20’s role “mission-critical.”
