Cambodia getting a China-backed, game-changing canal – Asia Times

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BANGKOK – Cambodia wants to divert Southeast Asia’s Mekong River into a planned US$1.7 billion, Chinese-financed shipping canal to reach a deep-sea port at Kep near Sihanoukville on southern Cambodia’s Gulf of Thailand coast.

The Funan Techo Canal would enable Cambodians to be “breathing through our own nose,” said newly elected Prime Minister Hun Manet, son and heir to long-time authoritarian former prime minister Hun Sen.

Cambodia, for the first time, could import and export goods by ship from its capital Phnom Penh’s port via the canal to a would-be deepwater port in Kep province on the Gulf of Thailand, opening onto the South China Sea.

Ships to and from Hong Kong, Singapore and other ports could reroute, or add shipping lanes, to Kep to access the canal if it increases trade. Shipping containers from those ocean-going vessels would be transferred by cranes at Kep to and from canal barges.

A successful Chinese-financed canal would also deepen Beijing’s economic, diplomatic and other links with Phnom Penh while lessening Cambodia’s dependence on Hanoi.

In 1994, the lack of a canal allowed Vietnam to block Cambodia’s shipping through the Mekong Delta because of a feud between the two countries.

Beijing reportedly signed the canal agreement with Phnom Penh under China’s Build-Operate-Transfer contract. Officials from China’s Belt and Road Initiative participated in the signing.

Cambodia “did not borrow money from China to build the canal,” said a delighted Prime Minister Hun Manet.

“Based on the contract for Funan Techo Canal, the Chinese company would manage the canal, including maintaining it and making a profit from charging for passage through the canal,” reported ThinkChina, a Singapore-based online information site.

“The Chinese company would transfer the management of the canal to the Cambodian government after a period of time, around 40 to 50 years.

“The Funan Techo Canal is one among many other of China’s key infrastructure projects in Cambodia,” ThinkChina’s researcher Sokvy Rim said.

Blueprints reportedly portray the canal as 180 kilometers long and 100 meters wide upstream, tapering to 80 meters further south.

Its “consistent depth of 5.4 meters” would handle cargo ships up to 3,000 deadweight tonnage. Ships would sail through three watergates, under 11 bridges, and along 208-kilometers of sidewalk.

More than 1.5 million Cambodians live along the route. It is unclear how many would be displaced by the project and where they would go.

The canal is close to Cambodia’s coastal Sihanoukville Special Economic Zone, the country’s busy premier deepwater port which Chinese investment and its Belt and Road Initiative is boosting.

Also nearby, the US is locked in a feud with Cambodia over Ream Naval base because it received Chinese financing and is open to international shipping, which Washington fears could eventually include Chinese warships.

If dug, the Funan Techo Canal could negatively impact nearby Vietnam’s profitable Cai Mep and other ports close to Ho Chi Minh City along the Mekong Delta’s mouth, which also opens on the South China Sea.

Currently, when Cambodia uses the Mekong River to import raw materials from China, or export finished products to the US, Europe and elsewhere, those ships carrying millions of tons of material must pass through Vietnam’s Mekong Delta to link Phnom Penh and Cambodia’s other upriver ports with the South China Sea.

Blue line represents Funan Techo Canal’s path to South China. Image: X Screengrab

Vietnam had been hoping its Mekong mouth monopoly would profit Hanoi if it was sweetened for Phnom Penh.

For example, earlier this year Cambodia and Vietnam signed a Treaty on Waterway Transportation to reduce restrictions on cross-border navigation, speed ships’ movements, streamline customs and immigration, and untangle other bureaucratic knots on the Mekong.

Vietnam, meanwhile, may also suffer from the planned canal’s drain on the Mekong’s fresh water. The Mekong is already considered an endangered river.

It originates in Tibet’s unpopulated glaciers and melts southeast, hitting several hydro-electric dams in China, Laos, and northern Cambodia which have already lessened the Mekong’s downriver volume.

The Mekong flows southeast from China and Laos into Cambodia, and on through southern Vietnam to the South China Sea.

As the Mekong passes Phnom Penh, some water bulges into a Tonle Sap Lake. Nearby downriver, the relatively narrow Bassac appears as a “distributary,” draining the Mekong to fill the Bassac’s own flow southeast across Vietnam to the Mekong Delta and sea.

The canal links Kep to the Bassac River, where vessels can switch to the Bassac, which is sourced nearby at the Mekong. To flood the canal and keep cargo vessels afloat, the Bassac River may need much more water from the Mekong.

That could negatively impact Vietnam’s Mekong Delta fishing areas, irrigation systems, and other riverside infrastructure and ecological systems.

Richard S Ehrlich is a Bangkok-based American foreign correspondent reporting from Asia since 1978, and winner of Columbia University’s Foreign Correspondents’ Award. Excerpts from his two new nonfiction books, “Rituals. Killers. Wars. & Sex. — Tibet, India, Nepal, Laos, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka & New York” and “Apocalyptic Tribes, Smugglers & Freaks” are available here.

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Commentary: China’s homegrown COMAC jet has its eye on Southeast Asia after Singapore debut

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Other incentives, including export credits (typically up to 85 per cent of a jet’s purchase price), may be extended to airlines willing to punt on the C919. Support in terms of maintenance, repair and overhaul, the construction of hangars and crew training are also included in the package.

That said, the C919 will still a hard sell outside of China’s domestic market. Air travellers may be wary of the “Made in China” label and COMAC has no track record to boost confidence, as a new and relatively unknown player.

Others say its weight – several tonnes heavier than the Airbus A320 and thus, less fuel-efficient – and limited range (5,500km vs about 6,500km for the A320 and Boeing 737 Max) make the C919 unattractive.

Christian Scherer, Airbus’ top salesman, told journalists after watching the C919 fly in Singapore that it “is not going to rock the boat”.

NOT IN THE GAME FOR MONEY, FOR NOW

But COMAC is not in the game to make money, at least not for now.

Its strategy is simple: Scale up at home, continue refining its planes, develop its own engines and exploit gaps in the market, at a time when Boeing is reeling from self-inflicted wounds.

While the US remains the world’s largest domestic aviation market, China is a close second and is projected to top the global market for aviation services by 2042, according to Airbus.

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Political Islam: Syariah-inspired laws in some parts of Malaysia, Indonesia worry non-Muslims

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KUALA LUMPUR/PADANG: Ms Hasyimah Ayuni has only recently taken an interest in Islam outside the mosque.

The youngest of seven siblings, Ms Hasyimah, who is pursuing a masters degree in environmental health at a university in Malaysia’s Klang Valley, now believes that it is her duty to live in accordance with Islamic principles. 

This came about following a court case that challenged the validity of several Syariah laws in the eastern state of Kelantan in February.    

Ms Hasyimah told CNA that as Malaysia has a Muslim majority, it was logical that laws for Muslims be given priority over other laws.

She also wants Malaysia to use Syariah laws instead of the common law system being used today.  

“As a Muslim, you have laws in your religion that God told you to follow but your country asks you to follow (their) laws, some which are based on Western sources (and) differ from your religion. Wouldn’t you feel angry and sad?” she said, adding that Islam covers all aspects of life. 

She believes Syariah laws are the best set of laws that would guarantee the wellbeing of both Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

“This is because the laws are based on legal sources for Muslims such as the Quran (Islam’s holy book),” she said. 

According to a study by the Pew Research Center in 2022, most Muslims in both Malaysia and neighbouring Indonesia favoured making Syariah the official law of the land. 

The results of the study, which were released in September last year, said that 86 per cent of Malaysian Muslims supported using Syariah as the official law of the land, while 64 per cent of Indonesian Muslims supported the idea.  

But communities in the two countries are debating whether these regulations should apply to all, or if Islam’s influence could impact diversity and social freedoms. 

According to the Pew Research Center, Syariah, or Islamic law, offers moral and legal guidance for nearly all aspects of life – from marriage and divorce, to inheritance and contracts, to criminal punishments. 

About 63.5 per cent of Malaysians are Muslims, according to official statistics.

Political analyst Azmi Hassan of the Nusantara Strategic Academy said most Muslims in Malaysia would say that Syariah law should be used to govern them, and this was regardless of where they come from or their status. 

“The belief is there in general. Syariah laws are considered to be the ultimate in governance and Muslims believe them to be the best laws compared to whatever other laws that are being practised,” he said.

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Reforestation seen as only viable smog solution

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Reforestation seen as only viable smog solution
The latest episode of the ‘Bangkok Post Deeper Dive’ vodcast explores a long-term solution to northern Thailand’s chronic smog problem.

Northern Thailand’s chronic smog problem is usually blamed on burning crop waste, villagers burning wooded areas to pick mushrooms and vehicle emissions. The solutions, we are told, involve regulations and enforcement.

But according to an increasing number of scientists and activists, the problem runs deeper and requires a worldwide solution if we are to avoid a climate catastrophe. The real issue? We have turned almost half the world’s habitable land into an animal farm.

In northern Thailand — and in neighbouring areas in Myanmar and Laos — we have cut down the forests and planted corn fed to chickens and pigs. That’s a quadruple whammy for air pollution and climate change: first, we lose the trees and other biomass that absorbed the greenhouse gases. Second, burning down the forest releases tonnes of greenhouse gases. Third, growing corn requires planting and ploughing fields, and making and spreading fertiliser, all activities that burn fossil fuels and emit nitrous oxide and another powerful pollutants. Fourthly, many farmers still burn their crop waste.

Most people seem aware only of the fourth, the burning of crop residues, and that is certainly a major cause. “What is affecting us most is the by-product of agricultural burning,” said Dr Rungsrit Kanjanavit of Chiang Mai University’s Faculty of Medicine in the documentary SMOKE: A crisis in Northern Thailand. “It doesn’t make a difference whether it’s forest burning or the burning of crop waste. They create small particulates that are hydrocarbon-based,” he explained, referring to PM2.5.

The ‘curse of corn’

For environmental activist Michael Shafer, corn is the primary cause of northern Thailand’s pollution problem. “The smoke problem in Chiang Mai province results largely from farmers burning their maize waste,” he told the Bangkok Post. “Some of the smoke originates in Myanmar, but likely from the fields of Thai companies. Maize, raised for animal feed by huge agricultural products companies, has resulted in the deforestation of large areas and the destruction of habitat, biodiversity and watershed.”

“Corn is really the issue here in Thailand. Animals eat corn… And more than half of this corn ends up being grown on what is technically legally protected forest areas.”

Burning a cornfield, however, is just the final twist of a greenhouse gas spigot that began with deforestation to plant the corn. “It is important to look at the numbers of the decline of national forest reserves,” said anti-deforestation campaigner Bunnaroth Buaklee. “Despite the status as a forest reserve, [in many places] the forest condition has disappeared.”

“There has also been severe forest destruction in Laos and Myanmar’s Shan State,” he added.

“The animal feed business [is behind] the clear decline of forests in the past 10 years, both in Thailand and neighbouring countries.”

In fact, the problem is worldwide. The percentage of forests and grasslands cleared for agriculture was 9% in 1700 — and 46% today. It’s mostly for livestock grazing and, like in northern Thailand, growing crops like corn and soy to feed pigs and chickens.

“The United Nations says that more climate change is attributable to the global meat industry than to all of the planes and trains and automobiles and trucks — all forms of transport combined,” Bruce Friedrich, director of the Good Food Institute, said in a TEDx talk.

“Every environmental issues you want to look at, from the smallest and most local to the largest and most global, the inefficiencies of animal agriculture are one of the top causes.”

What are those inefficiencies? According to Oxford University-affiliated Our World In Data, 77% of agricultural land is used to feed and graze livestock — yet it produces only 18% of global calories and 37% of protein. In fact, peer-reviewed academic studies show that it takes at least ten times as much fossil fuel, water and land to produce protein from animals rather than directly from the plants they eat. And because of that gross inefficiency, a full three-quarters of land now used for animal agriculture could be returned to nature if we cut out meat and dairy — upper Southeast Asia could be reforested, and the smog levels decimated.

Meat alternatives

Nobody is expecting diets to completely change overnight — especially with a dearth of competitively-priced alternatives. And that’s what spurred Chiang Mai-based entrepreneur Smith Taweelerdniti into action.

“I started reading many books,” he said in “Thailand’s burning issue”, the latest episode of the Bangkok Post Deeper Dive vodcast. He found out “a lot of diseases come from eating too many animal products. So I became vegetarian. But it was quite hard”.

What Mr Smith found difficult about giving up meat was the lack of alternatives in most shops and restaurants. Since his family firm is a food manufacturer, however, the businessman saw the relative shortage of meat-free options in stores and restaurants as an opportunity to create the brand Let’s Plant Meat.

“If I can create this at the right taste and the right pricing,” he said, “we’re giving options to people in here, Thailand and Asia, to wean away from animal meat”.

Mr Smith’s brand is far from the only meat alternative now available. CP Foods is blamed by some for the expanding cornfields, but the country’s largest corporation has also taken steps to mitigate the problem by launching a brand called Meat Zero. Seafood conglomerate Thai Union has developed a plant-based brand called OMG Meat, and many others are available in supermarkets and some convenience stores.

Mr Smith told the Bangkok Post that although sales of plant-based meat are currently down industry-wide because of the weak economy, sales on Shopee are rising and he is placing more emphasis on new meat-free versions of traditional Thai cuisine such as larb and kaphrao, particularly to Japan, where imports of meat products are restricted.

For Mr Smith and a growing number of experts, the only viable long-term solution is shifting from the land-hogging, polluting inefficiencies of obtaining our nutrients from meat towards a plant-based diet that would allow global reforestation, rewilding and regeneration of the vast tracts of land laid waste by animal agriculture.

“The global warming issue, the sustainability, the deforestation that come through the food that we eat… People say no to Styrofoam, say no to plastic bags,” he said. “They don’t know that the food they eat can also cause harm to the planet. Our diet can help the world.”

  • Watch ‘Thailand’s Burning Issue’, the latest episode of the Bangkok Post vodcast Deeper Dive, below or at https://spoti.fi/3TC3slj. Or search for Deeper Dive Thailand wherever you get your podcasts.

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Political Islam: Hijab rules and segregated pools – religion reshapes social norms in Malaysia, Indonesia

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Increase OF THE” MORAL POLICE”

In Malaysia, guidelines on respectable clothes, checks on young couples, the closing down of 4D betting shops, and religious “moral police” by the authorities are making Ms Siti Kasim anxiety for her country’s potential. &nbsp,

The lawyer fears that the country’s officials ‘” Islamization” may gradually and surely alter the government’s way of life. &nbsp,

Miss Siti Kasim, an outspoken critic of Muslim religious government, said that the imposition of faith was becoming more and more prevalent in the country, used and promoted by officials.

” The issue is that these folks want to pass more regulations to impose themselves on us. Politicians demand that we adhere to this spiritual kind of morality, which we must do. These rules are being implemented by the institutions. But, it is part of political Islam”, she said.

Some of the policies of the states of Kelantan and Terengganu, which have long supported the Islamist party Parti Islam Se-Malaysia ( PAS ), have been put under scrutiny for their social practices. They were equivalent to spiritual police, claim critics.

Muslims make up more than 95 per cent of the people in state such as Kelantan and Terengganu, higher than the 63.5 per cent in Malaysia.

In July 2023 for instance, an operator of a shop in Kota Bharu- the investment of Kelantan- was fined RM100 ( US$ 21.20 ) for allowing her female employee to reduce the hair of a Muslim female customer.

A non-Muslim shop owner was summoned for breaking the council’s bylaw for “indecent clothing” by operating shorts in her store a month later. &nbsp,

The girl was pictured wearing a big t-shirt that covered her clothes. &nbsp, &nbsp,

According to Section 34 ( 2 )( b ) of the 2019 Business and Industrial Trade Bylaws, non-Muslim business owners and non-Muslim employees are required to dress in “decent clothes.” &nbsp,

Following a conversation with the regional government, the Minister of Housing and Local Government Nga Kor Ming announced that the call had been postponed following the incident. &nbsp, &nbsp, &nbsp, &nbsp,

The Kota Bharu Municipal Council enforced and put into practice these rules, which purport to emphasize Islamic values, and likewise forbid advertisements that do not account for the humility of models.

In Kelantan, movies have been prohibited since 1990, the season PAS won the state, with several government staff claiming over the years that they could cause social problems.

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Political Islam: Why the religious conservatism wave is rising in Malaysia but ebbing in Indonesia

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In neighbouring Indonesia, problems over the rise of political Islam and spiritual conservative, especially in the guide- up to its latest poll last quarter, appear to have cooled.

According to spectators, neither the candidates running for president nor vice-presidential did anything to encourage personality politics. &nbsp,

Former governor of Jakarta Anies Baswedan and former prime minister of Solo, Prabowo Subianto and former mayor of Jakarta, Gujar Pranowo, ran with former PKB Mahfud MD Muhaimin Iskandar, who are currently the leaders of the Islamic National Awakening Party ( PKB ) and are now the three pair.

Contrary to the other two candidates, the succeeding trio of Mr. Prabowo and Mr. Gibran have never been affiliated with Islamic parties.

There was concern that religious conservatism would ruin the election, especially given that identity politics predominated the 2019 presidential and parliamentary elections and Jakarta’s 2017 presidential elections. &nbsp,

Mr Ujang Komarudin, a political Islam pro from Jakarta’s Al Azhar University, believes some social groups want to maintain Muslim ideologies but challenge to get in elections because Indonesian society is diverse.

” Honestly speaking, there are indeed people or groups who fight for an Islamist philosophy or political Islam.

” But if we look at the Muslim group, Islam itself around is diverse. It is not uniform,” said Mr Ujang. &nbsp,

And although about 87 per cent of Indonesia’s over 270 million persons are Muslims, many are not holy, Mr Ujang added. &nbsp,

Some Indonesians adhere to a reasonable Islamic practice, or, according to their identification cards, adhere to a different one, but do not actually practice it.

” This impacts the attitude of the citizens and their decision ( during elections ),” said Mr Ujang.

Analysts told CNA that Indonesia’s rising conservatism may be a result of the country’s basic philosophical theory of Pancasila as well as the conflicting ideologies of various Islamic political parties and their inability to win widespread support. &nbsp,

DIFFERING Beliefs GOVERNING ISLAMIST POLITICAL PARTIES&nbsp,

Mr. Ujang thinks that the Islamic political parties in Indonesia do not coexist and include divergent ideologies. This is unlike in Malaysia, with its dominant Islamist party, the Parti Islam Se- Malaysia ( PAS ). &nbsp,

” For case, PKB and the National Mandate Party ( PAN), do they work based on their ideas? I think certainly,” said Mr Ujang.

” They function based on hobbies, whether when forming a partnership or fighting. When they talk about Islam, they do n’t emphasize specific Islamic ideals but rather common or universal principles.

The Indonesian congress already contains nine social events. &nbsp,

Five of them are nationalist parties, and four of them have Islamic ideologies, namely PKB, PAN, the Prosperous Justice Party ( PKS) and the United Development Party ( PPP ).

Just PKB showed a substantial increase in votes in next month’s legislative elections, making it the third- largest party in the future 2024- 2029 parliament, whose members will be inaugurated in October. &nbsp,

Despite the benefits of the 2019 elections, it was the fifth-largest group in the legislature, trailing only Golkar, Gerindra, and Nasdem. &nbsp,

” Regarding the parliamentary election benefits, thank God. We at PKB are glad.

” Because we are led by Mr Muhaimin, who is Mr Anies’s vice- political candidate, we received a major bandwagon effect”, said Mr Zainul Munasichin, secretary of PKB’s election- winning unit.

The carrot effect is a political party figure’s ability to sway supporters of other candidates of the same party.

The coalition of PKB, PKS, and the nationalist party Nasdem supported Mr. Anies and Mr. Muhaimin in the most recent election. &nbsp,

Some analysts predicted that PKB and PKS would not be able to collaborate because they believed in a different branch of Islam before the coalition was formed. But PKB’s Mr Zainul told CNA that his party’s alliance with PKS was “purely tactical”.

Meanwhile, PAN- which backed Mr Prabowo and Mr Gibran- was founded by people who were members of Indonesia’s second- biggest Islamic organisation, Muhammadiyah.

Eddy Soeparno, PAN’s secretary general, claimed that due to the perception that the organization was right-wing and that its founder had participated in events attended by hardline Islamic groups, it performed slightly better in February’s election than it did five years ago. &nbsp,

The PPP, the only remaining Islamist party in parliament, is the oldest and has been around for 51 years.

It was one of the only three political parties to form the government of Suharto, along with the nationalist party PDI, now known as PDI- P. &nbsp, and nationalist party Golkar.

But in recent years, it has lost ground.

Mr Muhammad Romahurmuziy, chairman of PPP’s advisory council, attributed this to many factors.

One was due to the absence of a powerful political apparatus and leading figure.

According to Mr. Romahurmuziy,” We would need to go through a significant reorientation at the next party congress,” adding that it is scheduled for December of next year but could be delayed due to the most recent election results. &nbsp,

According to the official results released by the Indonesia’s General Elections Commission, PPP did not meet the minimum threshold of 4 per cent to enter the House of Representatives. The party will no longer be able to be represented in parliament, even though PPP will file a constitutional lawsuit against the results of the election at the Constitutional Court for the first time since its establishment in 1973.

Because Indonesia has a multi-party presidential system, Mr. Adi Prayitno, a political Islam expert from the Universitas Islam Negeri Syarif Hidayatullah, speculated that parties operate on interests rather than ideologies. &nbsp,

There is a perception that everyone is merely chasing electoral votes, according to Mr. Adi. &nbsp,

” In Indonesia, everything is being measured by political interests and not ideology” .&nbsp, &nbsp, &nbsp,

PANCASILA A WAY TO REIN IN IDENTITY POLITICS&nbsp,

According to Mr. Ujang from Al Azhar University, the majority of Indonesians do n’t buy Islamic conservatism as a selling point. &nbsp,

” The democracy in Indonesia is built on Pancasila,” said Mr. Ujang,” I do n’t think conservatism is a threat in Indonesia.”

Pancasila is Indonesia’s ideology, which consists of five principles: Belief in one and only God, justice and civilised humanity, unity of the country, democracy guided by the inner wisdom among representatives, and social justice for all Indonesians.

” And Pancasila is the home of all religions in Indonesia, creating harmony”, Mr Ujang said. &nbsp, &nbsp,

Mr Ahmad Khoirul Umam, a political lecturer from Islamic university Paramadina in Jakarta, concurred. &nbsp,

He claimed that this is what distinguishes Indonesian Islam from other religions in the area. &nbsp,

Mr Umam said Pancasila has become an identity of Indonesia, with its history dating back to the country’s first president, Sukarno. &nbsp,

Ahmad Suaedy, the dean of Islam Nusantara faculty at Nahdlatul Ulama Indonesia University, explained to CNA that Pancasila is the starting point for all political movements because it includes various ideologies. &nbsp, &nbsp, &nbsp,

” So, in Indonesia, there are many religious elements which are used by the state. But they are not part of the political symbol because of Pancasila”, said Mr Ahmad. &nbsp,

The analysts believe that Pancasila has been a key factor in keeping the nation united in a nation with about 1,300 different ethnic groups. &nbsp,

” We are grateful Indonesia has Pancasila, which unites different religious communities. So there is no reason for Islam to be so dominant and dangerous,” said Mr. Ujang.

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First step taken to legalise casinos

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House approves investigation that advises the creation of entertainment complexes

PUBLISHED: 28 Mar 2024 at 21: 32

First step taken to legalise casinos
At Casino Filipino Citystate in Manila, a player holds the cards. The Philippines is one of the Asian nations that rely on incorporated hotels and casinos to increase visitor visitors. ( Photo: Bloomberg )

Thailand has made its first move toward legalizing casinos in order to support the economy while also preventing income leak from illegal gambling. The government wants high-paying tourists to visit the country to support the economy.

A board of politicians ‘ recommendations to help games to be housed within big entertainment structures were approved by the House of Representatives on Thursday. The program received 253 votes out of the 257 existing legislators.

Julapun Amornvivat, deputy finance minister, stated that the study may be forwarded to the cabinet to decide whether legalizing casinos is” appropriate for the nation.”

Thailand is the most recent nation to think about competing for a share of the global game market, which IBIS World projections generated$ 263 billion in revenue next year.

The emirate of Abu Dhabi and Ras Al Khaimah were seen as the finalists when the United Arab Emirates established a model for legalizing gambling in September.

As a hedge against uncertain hopes in Macau, Galaxy Entertainment Group and MGM Resorts International have been researching possible entry of casino hotels in Thailand. Casino owners in Singapore and the Philippines are competing with Macau, which generated$ 22.75 billion in game revenue next year.

Thailand could increase tourism revenue by about$ 12 billion a year thanks to the study by the House panel, which found that legalizing casinos and putting them in large entertainment complexes would increase their revenues. When the entertainment centers are constructed, regular tourist spending could increase by 52 % to 65,050 baht per journey, which would add up to 449 billion ringgit, according to the study.

Srettha Thavisin, the prime minister, has been vocal in his support of the government’s efforts to boost foreign investment and promote hospitality, on Thursday. He praised the program to legalize what he called” the grey market” for better oversight and correct tax collection.

” It’s time for our world to quit hiding the playing, which is out there, and just effectively manage and take care of it”, he said.

” I’m not sure when the rules may be passed and an entertainment complex will begin to operate. It will most likely take some time. During the time period, we need to handle those improper activities”.

Any beginning of casinos would be seen as in line with the latest embrace of some liberal ideas to revive a hospitality industry that has yet to reach its pre-pandemic highs despite the majority of gambling being prohibited in Thailand.

Thailand became the first nation in Asia to decriminalise marijuana in 2022, despite the Pheu Thai-led administration’s recent move to ban its outdoor use. Additionally, the nation is expected to become the first in Southeast Asia to legalize same-sex unions.

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Myanmar’s widening war headed for junta’s heartland – Asia Times

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The wide and deeply disturbing contours of turmoil for the remaining of 2024 and into 2025 are now taking shape, even before the end of a clean season that has considerably altered the defense balance in Myanmar.

Recent months have seen large swathes of the nation’s borderlands fall under the control of powerful ethnic minority armies amid cascading defeats suffered by State Administration Council ( SAC ) military forces.

However, the war will almost certainly be waged at an increased level in the country’s highly populated cultural Bamar heartland and will be a really unique fight in the upcoming rainy season and beyond.

Short of a political implosion of the embattled regime in Naypyidaw– a conceivable but however unlikely scenario – the now discernable shift of major hostilities toward the center of national power promises a much less organized and more savagely destructive conflict than anything seen to date with certainly dire humanitarian consequences.

In the worst case scenario, there might be a rise in killing and population displacement in Southeast Asia that has n’t been seen since the Indochina wars of the 1970s.

The scale of the army’s recent battlefield losses and its impact on morale offers some ground for hope that the coming phase of the war might, if nasty and brutish, at least be short and that a” strategic offensive” announced by the opposition National Unity Government ( NUG) last December will push a weakened SAC regime toward collapse or break the military’s cohesion. &nbsp,

It remains to be seen how much criticism- led estimates of government decline are justified but the omens are at best combined.

The three distinct campaigns launched by ethnic resistance organizations ( EROs ) in Myanmar’s dry season ended in May have, if ever, effectively redrawn the military and administrative landscape in a way that a struggling SAC regime will not be able to reverse.

Launched by the joint Brotherhood Alliance of racial Palaung, Kokang Chinese and Rakhine rebel forces, the” Operation 1027″ that second opened on October 27 last year and finally swept across the northern of Shan state, seizing cities from SAC power and severing the most important business vessels to China.

A potent insurgent front has been formed by MNDAA, TNLA, and AA ethnic armed groups. Image: Facebook

Operation 1027 merged with an equally well-prepared and still ongoing campaign spearheaded by the Brotherhood’s numerically largest force, the Arakan Army ( AA ), which seized the majority of the state’s Rakhine on the Bay of Bengal in a slew of fierce assaults from mid-November.

And, in early March, it was the turn of the Kachin Independence Army (KIA ) to launch a strategic offensive, which in less than two weeks relieved pressure on its” capital” of Laiza on the China border and rolled up a string of army bases along the strategic road between the Kachin state capital of Myitkyina and the Ayeyarwady river port city of Bhamo.

Rebel blows that cause havoc

SAC forces continue to hold out in major urban centers, notably Lashio in Shan state, Sittwe in Rakhine and Myitkyina in Kachin. However, these insurgent campaigns ‘ ferocious success, which were the result of months of planning and preparation, had historically dealt the army with never-before-seen losses in munitions, morale, and manpower.

Assessments of battlefield casualties in Myanmar have more to do with informed guesswork than statistical certainty but it is reasonable to conclude that since late October the army has lost at least 8, 000 and probably more than 10, 000 men killed or captured.

This toll comes from a conservative breakdown of losses that were likely caused by the overrunning of two divisional-sized Military Operation Command headquarters ( MOC 16 in Hsenwi, Shan state, and MOC 9 in Kyauktaw, Rakhine state ), as well as at least 30 battalion bases, a sizable military training complex in Minbya township, and a number of smaller army and border police posts. &nbsp,

The more than 4, 000 soldiers who were given the go-ahead to a Regional Operations Command ( ROC ) in Laukkai, the capital of the Kokang region in Shan state, are not included in the list. If in the coming weeks the ROC at Sittwe and another MOC in Buthidaung in Rakhine were also to fall, this toll would obviously rise further.

The impact of this scandal, which unfolds in a matter of weeks, has undoubtedly shaken confidence at command levels and almost certainly contributed to the decision to institute a national conscription law with a call-up process starting in April. &nbsp, &nbsp, &nbsp,

The sheer volume of munitions and equipment lost in these repeated defeats was no less threatening. In addition to huge quantities of small arms and light weapons, the army has lost scores of heavy 122mm and a few 155mm howitzers and at least 50 armored fighting vehicles. Given the ethnic armies of the Brotherhood’s traditional capabilities, which they have never previously had.

Superimposing these human and material losses on a map of Myanmar reveals a politically and economically bankrupt regime encircled to the east, west, north and southeast by aggressively assertive ethnic opposition forces committed to its overthrow while at the same time facing relentless popular resistance across the military’s traditional powerbase in the national heartland.

Military logic suggests that the current coup regime’s defeat is the only way this forces-force correlation can be resolved strategically. The essential issue is how long this process may take and what cost it will exact.

Coming bloody battle

Expectations that recent advances in the borderlands have triggered a “tipping point” that can translate into a nationwide strategic offensive are almost certainly premature and need to be set against psychological and material factors that suggest the possibility, even likelihood, of a very bloody and long- drawn- out struggle across the central regions of the country.

In the first place, it would be foolish to ignore a ruling military caste’s peculiar psychoses, which show how, after seven decades of power, privilege, and impunity, it has come to view itself as the unavoidable protector of its soul.

The military elite’s messianic obsession with national salvation and an ingrained xenophobia never far beneath the surface merge easily enough into a more down- to- earth fight for institutional and personal self- preservation.

The story of a depleted and besieged Tatmadaw that stood firm and ultimately prevailed against insurgent forces then ravaged the Bamar heartland serves to reinforce these mindsets and unquestionably appeals to some regime supporters.

For most army rank and file, however, instinctive discipline, a paycheck and the defense of family and comrades undoubtedly hold greater psychological sway than any misconstrued reading of history.

Myanmar’s soldiers march in a formation during a parade to commemorate the nation’s 74th Armed Forces Day on March 27, 2019, in Naypyidaw. Photo: Asia Times Files / AFP / Thet Aung

It is also important to realize that the army’s losses since October have been significant but not decisive in terms of material.

According to one intelligence source’s tentative assessment, the army still almost certainly numbers around 70, 000 troops supported by militarized police and militia units organized under a unified command structure. This ballpark estimate is supported by a wider consensus among independent analysts.

Furthermore, at least some of these heartland forces constitute the praetorian core of military rule.

Most are typically paraded out on the March 27 Armed Forces Day parade and fall under the Naypyidaw and Yangon Regional Military Commands ( RMCs ), which include special forces companies and airborne-trained battalions. Others are assault battalions drawn from centrally commanded– but now badly mauled – Light Infantry Divisions ( LIDs ) based around the heartland in key garrison cities such as Meiktila, Magwe, Pakokku and Bago.

These loyalist units are made of well-equipped, disciplined troops with a high esprit de corps and an undeniable willingness to escalate the conflict with their backs now facing the wall, much like the Waffen SS of Nazi Germany.

As fighting spreads across the central plains in the months ahead, these units will be supported by artillery and air power that events over the past year indicate will have no compunction in leveling entire urban communities where popular resistance forces operate or seek to take control. They may also be supported by armored units, which have so far played virtually no part in the conflict.

Ranged on the other side of Myanmar’s now starkly existential divide are newly formed Peoples Defense Forces ( PDFs ) that since mid- 2021 have proved increasingly adept in guerrilla operations across wide swathes of central Myanmar, most notably in Sagaing but also in Mandalay, Magwe, Bago and southern Tanintharyi.

However, PDFs in the Myanmar heartland fight as loose coalitions of lightly armed guerrillas that, for the most part, have learned on the job, in contrast to the ethnic armies that have deployed trained and equipped battalions and brigades in carefully planned strategic offensives since October.

Operating mostly without strategic direction and with tactical command- and- control that is often weak, these armed bands still lack the organization and equipment for sustained offensive operations against conventional forces maneuvering in strength. In summary, if ethnic armies are prepared for” strategic offensive” prime time, their PDF allies are undoubtedly not.

This stark disparity raises the prospect of a potentially protracted and savage war across the crowded heartlands of Myanmar with far heavier losses in resistance ranks than seen to date accompanied by levels of civilian displacement that could well dwarf an estimated 2.3 million already driven from their homes.

Chaos avoiding

Two critical variables may serve to mitigate or perhaps even avoid a descent into open- ended, anomic chaos.

The most pressing concern is posed by military capability, as well as how well-equipped key EROs are to increase training and logistical support for heartland PDFs and, in some theaters, how much personnel they may even commit to their own.

The framework for such cooperation already exists on various fronts where EROs, most notably Kachin, Karen and Ta’ang, have trained, equipped and mentored affiliated PDFs since the early days of armed resistance to the coup.

However, a much greater level of support will be required to increase the capabilities of PDFs over the upcoming months and into the following year, which will require a lot more coordination between an ERO” coalition of the willing” and the NUG’s Defense Ministry.

Specifically, it will demand a willingness to mobilize and equip regular PDF units with heavier weapons– particularly anti- aircraft heavy machine guns and mortars – drawn from the cornucopia of munitions captured over recent months. &nbsp,

Against the backdrop of a traditionally fraught relationship between ethnic minorities and the dominant Bamar, the political and financial impediments to such a strategic initiative are significant. However, it’s conceivable that” crunch time” for making difficult decisions now has arrived rather than the past.

China’s role will also be important, if not critical. China’s intentions regarding using its influence over the Brotherhood to restrain large-scale support of PDFs under the NUG’s control or, alternatively, whether it has come to regard the Brotherhood allies as valuable proxies in defending its own interests in the Myanmar heartland and even more broadly in a post-SAC future. &nbsp,

A second variable hinges on PDF forces adopting a more unified military strategy. The dangers of a” strategic offensive” were amply demonstrated during the previous dry season at Kawlin, a district center of no significant strategic importance in Upper Sagaing, which was supported by the KIA on November 6 at the heady height of 1027 euphoria. &nbsp, &nbsp,

Members of the Karenni People’s Defense Force (KPDF) are pictured in this photo, which was taken on July 7, 2021, undergoing military training at their camp in Kayah state near Demoso. Photo: Asia Times Files / AFP / Stringer

Kawlin was hailed by the NUG as a model for a liberated administration, but it was shelled, bombed, depopulated, and finally retaken by the military in February, which is a clear indication of why it was seized in the first place if there was no longer a better plan.

More recently, in early March, the same opportunistic approach was adopted at Kani, a town on the Chindwin River also in Upper Sagaing where PDFs joined forces in a determined attempt to overrun the center only to have to withdraw under intense army pressure ten days later.

Moving to seize towns at this point of the war prompted a concerted counterpunch that PDFs are unable to withstand, as both cases demonstrated. If these reverses could happen in Sagaing where PDFs have made hard- won battlefield progress, similar forays in Mandalay or Magwe regions would also certainly be repelled.

A strategic strategy with significantly better chances of success, rather than an uncoordinated and expensive opportunism, might focus on arteries of communication and resupply. Progressively asserting control along highways and restricting military movement between towns has two obvious benefits.

First, it forces the army out of urban bases into exhausting road opening operations, which eventually turn out to be prohibitively expensive. This dynamic is already visible on the Asia Highway to the Thai border at Myawaddy where the Karen and allied PDFs have essentially taken control of the road east of Kawkareik town.

Second, a primary offensive focus on roads and railways provides time and space for building better-organized PDF units at battalion and brigade levels, forces that in the context of wider strategic planning will eventually be able to take and hold urban centers in the face of constant guerrilla harassment that extends into urban areas.

Neither the improvement of PDF capabilities nor the adoption of a strategic approach to operations in the heartland can or should be taken for granted. Indeed, the NUG at the center of a terrifyingly disorganized battlespace arguably militates against them given the political and logistical strains they impose on them.

The alternative to progress on both crucial fronts, however, may well be a descent into years of increasingly chaotic and costly violence with regional repercussions that are impossible to predict.

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