InternatIonal
the Morung express
Hong Kong debates election reform plan with veto likely HONG KONG, JuNE 17 (REutERs): Hong Kong’s pro-democracy lawmakers appeared to be standing firm on Wednesday in their pledge to veto Beijing-backed electoral reforms, as the Asian financial center’s legislature debated the package that will define its democratic future. The former British colony has reinforced security after mass protests crippled parts of the city late last year, presenting China’s ruling Communist Party with one of its biggest political challenges in decades. More than a thousand people converged outside government buildings as debate began on a blueprint that would allow a direct vote for Hong Kong’s next leader in 2017, but only from pre-screened, pro-Beijing candidates. Opponents want a genuinely democratic election for the city’s chief executive in line with Beijing’s promise of universal suffrage made when the territory returned to Chinese rule in 1997. Pro-democracy activists climbed over metal fences separating them from the Beijing supporters, many of whom were wearing numbered shirts, the significance of which was not immediately clear. The two sides cursed and threw garbage and fights broke out. The council adjourned in the evening without a
vote which is expected no later than Friday. Democracy activists swore at proestablishment lawmakers as they filed out of the building. “You don’t represent us, you represent the central government!” one middleaged woman shouted, using a common and colorful Cantonese expletive. Hong Kong’s 27 “pandemocrats”, who hold a crucial one-third veto bloc in the 70-seat Legislative Council, have vowed to oppose what they call a “fake” democratic model. Three democrats who spoke early during the debate reiterated that pledge. If the reform proposals are passed unexpectedly, pro-democracy groups have vowed to protest. “This morning I got a very long and well-written letter, which was from a student. (They) hope I will support the proposal,” democrat Ronny Tong, who was close to tears, told reporters before the debate began. “I cannot think of anyone in Hong Kong who is happy today. I have been a legislator for 11 years, with an aim to fight for universal suffrage. Today I will cast a negative vote for an incomplete and unsatisfactory political reform proposal.” Democratic lawmaker Claudia Mo called the package a “maggot-eaten apple”. “This motion, this resolution is a fraud,” Mo said.
“This bill makes nonsense of the word democracy. It is a very bogus version of universal suffrage.” Last year’s protests revealed sharp divisions in Hong Kong and public opinion on the reforms remains split. The final round of a rolling poll conducted by three Hong Kong universities showed 47 percent of respondents backed the reform proposal. Thirtyeight percent were against, while 15 percent were undecided. Pro-democracy lawmakers holding boxes of votes collected from public against the “Cannot Go On Like This” Beijing supporters easily outnumbered the roughly 400 pro-democracy protesters on Wednesday. Activist groups had said they expected 100,000 protesters to show up. “The bill needs to go through. We have to support Hong Kong stability. We cannot keep carrying on like this,” said a 60-yearold man surnamed Chan, who declined to give his first name. “We have worked so hard all these years,” said Chan, who was waving a Chinese flag. Pro-Beijing supporters also played the Chinese national anthem through loudspeakers. One pro-democracy protester wearing a black T-shirt which read “Reject Fake Suffrage” held a blackand-white banner that declared: “Overthrow the Communist dictatorship”. Inside the legislature,
North Korea says it has been hit by worst drought in 100 years sEOuL, JuNE 17 (AP): North Korea says it has been hit by its worst drought in a century, resulting in extensive damage to agriculture. The official Korean Central News Agency said the drought has caused about 30 percent of its rice paddies to dry up. Rice plants normally need to be partially submerged in water during the early summer. “Water level of reservoirs stands at the lowest, while rivers and streams (are) getting dry,” it said in
a report Tuesday. An official from South Korea’s Unification Ministry, who asked not to be identified because of office rules, said precipitation in North Korea was abnormally low in May. Its production of rice and potatoes could decline by as much as 20 percent compared to average years if the shortage of rainfall extends to early July, he said. The official couldn’t confirm North Korea’s claim that it was experiencing its worst drought in a century.
KCNA said other crops were being planted in paddy fields in an attempt to reduce the agricultural shortfall. North Korea suffered a devastating famine during the 1990s that is believed to have killed hundreds of thousands of people. The famine is also believed to have loosened the authoritarian state’s control over the economy by damaging its public food distribution system and paving the way for private economic activity in unofficial markets.
“Me? Rich?” USA presidential hopefuls play middle-class card NEW YORK, JuNE 17 (REutERs): Don’t call Chris Christie rich. The Clintons say they still have bills to pay. And Mike Huckabee? Despite his wealth, he was born “blue collar, not blue blood.” Touting one’s humble beginnings has been part of U.S. presidential contenders’ playbook going back to Abraham Lincoln’s talk of his log cabin youth. But the 2016 hopefuls are working harder than ever to convince voters they are just like them. In burnishing their working- and middle-class credentials the hopefuls are following a shift in the political debate from jobs and a fragile economic recovery during the 2012 campaign to one now centered on income inequality. That reflects a deepening sense that seven years after the Great Recession any gains have gone to the wealthy, while millions of Americans continue to struggle. “The divide between the governing elite and the voters has never been so big,” said David Carney, a New Hampshire-based Republican strategist. Most of today’s presidential candidates, he noted, come from privileged backgrounds, leaving them open to criticism that they can’t relate to the money worries of so many families. John Weaver, a former advisor to 2008 Republican nominee John McCain, said candidates understand that. “Wide swathes of the country, geographically and demographically, have been left behind. Politicians are clever enough to figure that out.” Many respondents in Reuters polls say a candidate’s wealth would influence how they vote. The number of those who say they would be much less or somewhat less likely to support a “very wealthy” presidential candidate rose to 42 percent in March 2015 from 39 percent in November 2012. To be sure, Americans have elected plenty of rich presidents, such as John F. Kennedy in 1960. Tim Albrecht, a Republican strategist from Iowa, calls the current
phenomenon of candidates playing down their wealth “the Romney effect.” Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican nominee, often came across as distant or indifferent, a factor in his general election loss. Humbler Than Thou With a crowded field - at least 12 Republican hopefuls have declared so far even just a few percentage points could separate front runners from also rans, making it crucial to appeal to as many people as possible. Thus the humble roots card from many candidates, even if most are still among the wealthiest Americans. While many of them skew quite wealthy - such as former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, worth about $59 million - a few have more modest nest eggs, such as Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, whose most recent financial disclosure suggests a net worth that is perhaps in the tens of thousands, but is possibly even negative. The humbler-than-thou game nonetheless favors candidates such as Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who often talks of his Cuban immigrant parents, his father a bartender, his mother a maid, and his own student debt. It is no coincidence that reforming student loans is one of his policy proposals. His net worth was $443,509 in 2013, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a non-profit group that tracks money in U.S. politics. And Walker often talks about penny pinching, bragging in New Hampshire this year that he once stacked so many coupons and discounts that he bought a sweater at discount department store Kohl’s for $1. At the other end of the spectrum are Republicans Fiorina and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Democrat Hillary Clinton. They are most vulnerable to criticism that they are out of touch not just because of their considerable personal wealth but also because of their association with powerful political families.
government’s controversial electoral proposal outside the Legislative Council in Hong Kong, Wednesday, June 17, 2015. Hong Kong election reform proposals that sparked massive street protests last year in the southern Chinese financial center were presented Wednesday to lawmakers. (AP Photo)
democrats stood in a row with signs with crosses on them as they pledged to vote down the plan. Tension has been running high, especially after 10 people were arrested this week on suspicion of explosives offences. Six of them appeared in court on Wednesday charged with conspiracy to cause an explosion. The six were not asked to enter pleas. A 29-year-old woman was let out on bail of HK$20,000 ($2,580). Five men were remanded in custody. The Communist Party’s official People’s Daily said in a front-page commentary that the vote was fundamentally about ensuring long-term prosperity and stability. The proposed package, it added, was designed to
be a broadly representative one all sides could accept. “Looking around the world, some countries’ and regions’ universal suffrage systems are not in line with the actual situation on the ground, causing social chaos, economic hardship and difficulties too numerous to mention,” the paper said. Beijing has tried to lobby pro-democracy lawmakers to back the blueprint. Hong Kong’s Independent Commission Against Corruption has also said it is investigating allegations by an unidentified legislator that he was offered a bribe to vote for the package. Hong Kong returned to China under a “one country, two systems” formula that gives it a separate legal system and greater free-
doms than the party-ruled mainland - and the promise of universal suffrage. Thousands of activists blockaded major roads across Hong Kong for 79 days last year, defying tear gas and pepper spray, to press China to honor that promise. While flawed, the package is still the most progressive electoral model ever offered by China’s leaders in what might be a pilot for other cities within mainland China, according to a source close to Beijing’s leadership. If the plan is vetoed, Hong Kong’s next leader will be selected as before by a 1,200-member committee stacked with proBeijing loyalists. Beijing would be unlikely to offer any fresh concessions to Hong Kong anytime soon.
Thursday 18 June 2015
Dimapur
9
Amnesty accuses Myanmar govt of intimidating media
YANGON, JuNE 17 (AP): Myanmar’s government is using threats, harassment and imprisonment to intimidate the media ahead of national elections later this year, Amnesty International said Wednesday. The London-based human rights group said efforts to restrict freedom of expression have intensified over the past year, with at least 10 members of the media currently languishing in prison, all of them jailed in the last 12 months. Such actions belie claims of liberalization since the country started a democratic transition in 2011 from a military regime to an elected civilian government that vowed democratic reforms, Amnesty said in a 22page report. Significant changes have been made in moving the country to a free-market economy, and Myanmar has a parliament for the first time in more than two decades. Formal censorship has been dropped and the electronic and print media opened to competition, but the government has aggressively prosecuted publications and journalists over stories it has found offensive. “What we are seeing in Myanmar today is repression dressed up as progress,” Amnesty said in a statement that quoted its Southeast Asia research director, Rupert Abbott. “Authorities are still relying on the same old tactics — arrests, surveillance, threats and jail time to muzzle those journalists who cover ‘inconvenient’ topics.” Information Minister and presidential spokesman Ye Htut disputed Amnesty’s criticism. “We usually don’t pay attention to such statements by international organizations because they focus solely on freedom of expression,” he said. Ye Htut said that because Myanmar is still making a transition to democracy, it has to measure freedom based on “the country’s fragile social and political factors, freedom along with responsibility and abidance of media ethics.” Myanmar most serious challenges include placating armed ethnic minorities who for decades have been seeking greater autonomy, and ending often violent communal tensions between Buddhist and Muslims. The upcoming polls are expected to see Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party perform strongly against the current military-backed government, threatening the power of the army, which many see as still pulling the strings in running the country. Amnesty cited the cases since 2014 of at least 10 journalists imprisoned from two to seven years under criminal charges and “vaguely formulated laws” and the killing of a journalist in military custody. The group charged that the authorities are also often dragging the media through lengthy and costly legal processes, or relying on collective punishment where the response to one critical story is prosecuting several people from the same outlet to effectively shut down the whole outlet.