ISRAEL
HRW director ordered out
The Ministry of the Interior has given a Human Rights Watch (HWR) director two weeks to leave the country, accusing him of promoting a boycott. The ministry on Tuesday said it had terminated the residency permit of HRW’s Israel and Palestine director Omar Shakir, a US citizen, over accusations that he supported a boycott of Israel. Israeli officials have clamped down on groups seen as supporting the global campaign for BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions), which aims to pressure the nation to end its occupation of the Palestinian territories. HRW has written several critical reports about the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. “This is not about Shakir, but rather about muzzling Human Rights Watch and shutting down criticism of Israel’s rights record,” the New York-based rights group said in a statement. “Neither Human Rights Watch nor its representative, Shakir, promotes boycotts of Israel.”
VIETNAM
Hanoi calls out Beijing
Hanoi has demanded Beijing remove military equipment from contested islands in the South China Sea, saying reported missile installations are a “serious violation” of the nation’s sovereignty. The warning follows a report from US network CNBC last week that China had installed anti-ship and air-to-air defenses on the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島), which Taiwan also claims. China did not confirm the new military equipment, but last week affirmed its right to build defense facilities in the South China Sea. Hanoi called Beijing’s latest moves a threat to peace and asserted its historical and legal rights to the islands. “Vietnam requests China ... not to militarize [and] withdraw military equipment that were illegally deployed on structures under Vietnam’s sovereignty,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Le Thi Thu Hang said in a statement late on Tuesday.
MALDIVES
Chief justice jailed
The Criminal Court on Tuesday sentenced Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed to four months and 24 days in prison on charges of obstructing government administration and justice. Saeed was found guilty of preventing the Supreme Court from receiving letters from the government. He was arrested in February during a political crisis that followed a Supreme Court order for the release and retrial of some of President Yameen Abdul Gayoom’s jailed political opponents because of alleged violations of due process during their earlier trials. He also faces charges of terrorism which carry a longer maximum sentence.
AUSTRALIA
More aid to Pacific nations
The nation is refocusing its foreign aid programs in a move to win hearts and minds in the island nations of the Pacific, as an increasingly assertive China flexes its muscles in the region. The government has pledged more than A$1.3 billion (US$970 million) — its largest ever aid commitment to the Pacific — to fund projects including an undersea communications cable to Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. The government said the reorientation of its aid priorities, revealed in a budget on Tuesday, reflected “the fundamental importance to Australia of the stability and economic progress of Pacific island countries.” Canberra and other regional capitals have become increasingly alarmed at China’s push into the Pacific, which could upset the strategic balance in the region. The Lowy Institute estimated that China provided US$1.78 billion in aid, including concessional loans, to Pacific nations between 2006 and 2016.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not