Marcus Ching (Page 518)

Myanmar’s ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been moved to house arrest after the military detained her following a coup in February 2021.

Ms Suu Kyi was taken to a government building in Nay Pyi Taw on Monday, prison sources told BBC Burmese. She’d spent a year in solitary confinement.

The 78-year-old is serving a 33-year sentence, after being jailed in closed-door, military-run trials.

Almost no news has emerged about her condition in more than two years.

There has been no public confirmation of her transfer from jail, but the move to house arrest could be a positive sign from the military authorities, who have faced numerous calls to release the country’s democratically-elected leader.

Ms Suu Kyi was rumoured to have been ill, but the military has denied the reports. Earlier this week a source from the Nay Pyi Taw prison where she was being held told BBC Burmese that she was in good health.

Thailand’s foreign minister also revealed this month that he had visited Ms Suu Kyi – however he disclosed no further detail.

The military has arranged a meeting between Ms Suu Kyi and T Khun Myat, the Speaker of the lower house of parliament, BBC Burmese reported. However no details have been confirmed.

Since the coup, Myanmar has spiralled into a civil war, which has killed thousands of people. Sanctions imposed on the military have failed to stop the violence.

Ms Suu Kyi, who was under house arrest following the coup, was moved to solitary confinement in June last year.

She denies all of the accusations and rights groups have condemned the court trials as a sham.

Awarded the Nobel peace prize, Ms Suu Kyi was one of the world’s leading democracy icons. Her release from detention in 2010 was celebrated in Myanmar and around the world.

But she was later criticised for defending her country against allegations of genocide at the UN International Court of Justice (ICJ) after widespread claims that Myanmar had committed atrocities against Muslim Rohingya while her government was in power.

The first sign of invasion comes with a group of attack helicopters flying low over the northern Taiwan coast.

Following close behind, a bigger group of dark green assault helicopters loaded with troops.

Then from behind low sand-dunes, two dozen amphibious assault vehicles move with surprising speed along the wide beach, their tracks churning up the sand. Soon they are disgorging scores of soldiers.

For a few minutes it seems Taiwan’s defenders have been caught with their pants down.

But then a siren wails, heavily armed soldiers are running along trenches, the rat-tat-tat of heavy machine gun fire. Out of nearby woods come battle tanks and armoured vehicles, their guns booming.

Apache attack helicopters roar in over the hills, strafing the invading troops. The beach erupts with loud explosions. The invaders are pinned down, then driven back. The invasion is vanquished. Taiwan is safe.

It’s all taken about 20 minutes.

“Today we have shown that we will do our utmost to defend and protect our country” the commanding officer tells the gaggle of reporters standing on a roof top watching all this unfold. “We are confident that through these exercises we will be ready to respond to any situation.”

Really?

A cynic watching today might say the battle wasn’t terribly realistic. The invading forces were tiny. The defenders were all waiting for them. It was all entirely scripted, and victory came rather too quickly and too easily.

But that cynic would be a little unfair.

I remember being taken around Taiwan’s annual Han Kuang military exercises as a young reporter 25 years ago. Then it really was a show for the cameras.

“I would say this is an inflection point.” Says Alessio Palatano, Professor of war studies at King College in London. “There was a perception internationally that Taiwan was complacent about its military. This week you really get a sense of that they are starting to grapple seriously with significant changes”.

It’s clear Taiwan is learning from what’s happened in Ukraine.

On the first day of the war there, Russian troops grabbed an airport on the edge of Kiev and used it as a base to assault the Ukrainian capital. It failed.

So now Taiwan is focused on its most vulnerable points – places China would have to take control of if it were to successfully invade the island.

Those include the beaches of northern Taiwan, but also the main international airport and its main seaports.

But Professor Palatano says Ukraine has been crucial in another way. It has broken the complacent belief that China would never attack the island.

“The war in Ukraine shattered this fundamental assumption that war is a thing of the past. That it’s not going to happen anymore. And once that sort of myth is shattered, then everything else starts to be re-evaluated.”

For those who’ve been listening, China’s president Xi Jinping has been making it clear for several years that attacking Taiwan absolutely is an option.

And China is building the air and naval forces to make that possible.

President Xi has a clear timetable. By 2027 China should have the capability to fight and win a regional conflict. By 2035 It should be a world class military power. By 2049 the rejuvenation of the motherland should be complete .

For Taiwan the clock is ticking.

“So we know that it has that deadline” says Prof Palatano. “However, the use of force is not the first option. It is the option only if everything else fails. The objective is not the use of force per say, but having Taiwan capitulating, because it understands that coming back home is inevitable.”

It’s called coercive diplomacy, and the objective is to convince the people and government of Taiwan that resistance is futile.

The squeeze has already begun. In the first six months of this year the number of incursions into Taiwan airspace by Chinese military aircraft is up more than 60% compared to the same period last year. Beijing is now continuously pushing the limits, creating a “new normal”.

Taiwan has a lot to do.

It is moving to increase military service to one year, from the current four months. It is revamping its military strategy to make the island more resilient to cyber-attack, and actual attack.

It is following Ukraine in buying lots of smaller but more mobile missile systems that can be used against tanks, ships and aircraft and is also about to launch its first home-built submarine. But many of its conscript soldiers remain woefully under trained, and its weapons systems and military doctrine old and out of date.

There is one thing that is very striking. Despite the hugely disproportionate scale of China’s economic and military strength, the psychological pressure does not seem to be working. More than 70% of Taiwanese now say they would fight to defend their island home. So far they do not believe resistance is futile.

Kim Jong Un showed off North Korea’s latest weapons to Russia’s defence chief Sergei Shoigu on Wednesday.

Pyongyang invited the Russian delegation led by Mr Shoigu, as well as Chinese officials.

They will attend Pyongyang’s celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the Korean War’s armistice, marked typically by massive military parades.

The weapons on display included the Hwasong intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Successfully tested in April, It is believed to be the country’s first ICBM to use solid propellants, which makes it quicker to launch than liquid-fuel ones.

Also on show were two new drone designs, including one resembling the primary offensive strike drone used by the US Air Force, according to NK News, a specialist site focusing on North Korea.

The friendly tour comes amid accusations that Pyongyang is supplying Russia with arms for use in its war in Ukraine – a claim that both Pyongyang and Moscow deny.

North Korea’s KCNA said Mr Kim and Mr Shoigu discussed “matters of mutual concern” in the fields of national defence and on the international security environment.

The delegations’ visit for North Korea’s Victory Day – as the 1953 end of hostilities is called in the North – is expected to finish on Thursday with an extensive military parade. The Koreas are technically still at war because no peace agreement was reached when the conflict ended.

Both Russia and China are long time allies of North Korea. Their visit marks the first time Mr Kim has thrown open the doors to foreign guests since the Covid pandemic.

The last time Pyongyang invited foreign government delegates for a military parade was in February 2018.

Mr Kim had a “friendly talk” with Mr Shoigu, who handed him an autographed letter from Russian President Vladimir Putin, KCNA said, adding that he had later called North Korea’s military “the most powerful” in the world.

The visiting Chinese delegation, led by politburo member Li Hongzhong, also handed a personal letter from Mr Xi to Mr Kim.

Mr Kim reportedly told Mr Li that “the Korean people will never forget the fact that the brave soldiers of the Chinese People’s Volunteers shed blood to bring about the war victory”.

Beijing had sent troops in the autumn of 1950 to support North Korea in the war against South Korea. The then Soviet Union also supported North Korea in the war.

Since the collapse of the USSR in 1991, Russia has remained a natural ally for North Korea because of their mutual dislike for the US.

Some analysts say the inclusion of Chinese and Russian envoys in this year’s Victory Day parade hints at a possible loosening of Covid restrictions.

This comes weeks after images of North Koreans walking around without masks were shown on state media.

The reclusive country had sealed itself off from all trade and diplomatic ties in early 2020, even with Russia and China, its main economic and political partners.

Singapore is scheduled to execute a woman for the first time in almost 20 years, human rights advocates say.

Singaporean national Saridewi Djamani, 45, was found guilty of trafficking 30g (0.03oz) of heroin in 2018.

She will be the second drug convict to be executed in three days, after fellow Singaporean Mohd Aziz bin Hussain, and the 15th since March 2022.

Singapore has some of the world’s toughest anti-drug laws, which it says are necessary to protect society.

Aziz was convicted of trafficking 50g of heroin. Singapore mandates the death penalty for trafficking of more than 15g of heroin and more than 500g of cannabis.

Last April, another Singaporean, Tangaraju Suppiah, was executed for trafficking 1kg (35oz) of cannabis that he never touched. Authorities say he co-ordinated the sale via mobile phone.

Singapore’s Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) declined to comment on Djamani’s case when contacted by the BBC.

In an earlier statement, the CNB said Aziz was accorded “full due process”, and that his appeal against his conviction and sentence was dismissed in 2018.

British billionaire Sir Richard Branson, has again criticised Singapore for its executions, saying the death penalty is not a deterrent against crime.

“Small-scale drug traffickers need help, as most are bullied due to their circumstances,” Mr Branson said on Twitter.

It is not too late to stop Saridewi’s execution, he said.

Saridewi is one of two women on death row in Singapore, according to the Transformative Justice Collective, a Singapore-based human rights group.

She will be the first woman executed by the city-state since hairdresser Yen May Woen in 2004, the group said. Yen was also convicted of drug trafficking.

Local has media reported that Saridewi testified during her trial that she was stocking up on heroin for personal use during the Islamic fasting month.

While she did not deny selling drugs such as heroin and methamphetamine from her flat, she downplayed the scale of those activities, noted judge See Kee Oon.

Authorities argue that strict drug laws help keep Singapore as one of the safest places in the world and that capital punishment for drug offences enjoys wide public support.

But anti-death penalty advocates refute this.

“There is no evidence that the death penalty has a unique deterrent effect or that it has any impact on the use and availability of drugs,” said Amnesty International’s Chiara Sangiorgio in a statement.

“The only message that these executions send is that the government of Singapore is willing to once again defy international safeguards on the use of the death penalty,” she said.

Amnesty International noted that alongside China, Iran and Saudi Arabia, Singapore is one of only four countries to have recently carried out drug-related executions.