South Asia Archives - Page 2 of 9

13Nov

By SHOAHNo Comments

South Asia

After Hearing Accounts of Sexual Violence, UN Official to Bring Rohingya Case to ICC

NOVANEWS Survivors who fled Myanmar told UN representative Pramila Patten about their experiences with “gang-rape by multiple soldiers, forced public nudity and humiliation, and sexual slavery in military captivity.” by Jessica Corbett After hearing personal accounts of torture and sexual violencefrom survivors, a senior United Nations official on Sunday vowed to raise the issue of persecution of the Rohingya people in Myanmar with the International Criminal Court (ICC). “Sexual violence is being commanded, orchestrated, and perpetrated by the Armed Forces of Myanmar,” said Pramila Patten, special representative of the Secretary-General on sexual violence in conflict. “When I return to New York I will brief and raise the issue with the prosecutor and president of the ICC whet...

9Oct

By SHOAHNo Comments

South Asia

Red star over Nepal

NOVANEWS By M K Bhadrakumar | Indian Punchline The Communist Party of Nepal-UML led by KP Oli, Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) led by Prachanda and the breakaway Naya Shakti Nepal led by Baburam Bhattarai have announced on October 3 the formation of a grand leftist alliance for the forthcoming provincial and federal elections in Nepal on November 26 and December 7 under the new constitution. The polarization of Nepal’s fragmented political spectrum on ideological lines makes the forthcoming elections a watershed event. In reaction to the unexpected development, the Nepali Congress is reportedly planning to assemble a motley coalition of right-wing forces with some smaller parties to counter the grand leftist alliance. Interestingly, the constituents of the right-wing alliance m...

15Aug

By SHOAHNo Comments

India, South Asia

The Unwanted: Indian Government Threatens to Deport Rohingya Refugees to Myanmar

NOVANEWS © AP Photo/ Todd Pitman Last week, the Indian central government directed state authorities to deport illegal immigrants from India, including Rohingyas, a Muslim ethnic minority that is in danger of persecution in their home country of Myanmar, The Times of India reported. About 40,000 Rohingyas have fled to India after being rejected from their home country and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has issued identification cards to about 16,500 Rohingyas to prevent them from being harassed, arbitrarily arrested, detained or deported. © AFP 2017/ STRDEL UN Report Details ‘Campaign of Terror’ Against Rohingya People in Myanmar According to the Indian Ministry of Home Affairs, "Due to a variety of reasons, including political and eco...

17Jul

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South Asia

Over 80,000 Rohingya children ‘wasting’ from hunger in Myanmar

NOVANEWS The United Nations has warned that tens of thousands of Rohingya Muslim children under the age of five are in dire need of treatment for “acute malnutrition” in Myanmar’s western state of Rakhine. The World Food Program (WFP) reported on Monday that 80,500 children living in the areas are “wasting” and will need treatment for acute malnutrition within the next 12 months. According to WFP spokesperson in Myanmar, the “wasting” condition, which is a rapid weight loss that can become fatal, impairs the functioning of the immune system. “Based on the household hunger scale, about 38,000 households corresponding to 225,800 people are suffering from hunger and are in need of humanitarian assistance,” said the report. The agency warned that “households with children under the age ...

8May

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South Asia

The Universal Lesson of East Timor

NOVANEWS By John Pilger Global Research Filming undercover in East Timor in 1993 I followed a landscape of crosses: great black crosses etched against the sky, crosses on peaks, crosses marching down the hillsides, crosses beside the road. They littered the earth and crowded the eye. The inscriptions on the crosses revealed the extinction of whole families, wiped out in the space of a year, a month, a day. Village after village stood as memorials. Kraras is one such village. Known as the “village of the widows”, the population of 287 people was murdered by Indonesian troops. Using a typewriter with a faded ribbon, a local priest had recorded the name, age, cause of death and date of the killing of every victim. In the last column, he identified the Indonesian battalion respon...

11Dec

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South Asia

Najib gives stern warning to Myanmar, Suu Kyi

NOVANEWS Aedi Asri Prime Minister Najib Razak says he does not care if Malaysia's protest and pressure on the Rohingya issue threatens relations with Myanmar. KUALA LUMPUR: Referring to the plight of the Rohingya Muslims as a humanitarian issue, Prime Minister Najib Razak said he does not care if Malaysia’s firm stand on the issue threatens relations with Myanmar. “Myanmar says I am interfering in their personal business. I do not care. “We want to show Myanmar and tell Aung San Suu Kyi (Myanmar’s de facto leader) that enough is enough,” he said during his speech at the solidarity rally for the Rohingya today where he was greeted by the cheers of the 10,000-strong crowd, many of whom were Rohingya. Najib was referring to the Myanmar president’s office deputy director U Zaw Htay’s ...

3Nov

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South Asia

Myanmar army forces about 2,000 Rohingyas from homes

NOVANEWS Press TV The Myanmar army has forced about 2,000 Rohingya Muslims to abandon their homes in a village, as part of a crackdown on the religious minority following the recent attacks on border security forces. Sources said border guards on Sunday went to Kyee Kan Pyin village, in the central region of Mandalay, and ordered about 2,000 villagers to evacuate it, giving them just enough time to collect basic household items. The villagers were forced for a second night to stay and hide in rice fields without shelter. “I was kicked out from my house yesterday afternoon, now I live in a paddy field outside of my village with some 200 people including my family, I became homeless,” said a Rohingya man from the raided village. “After the soldiers arrived at our village, the...

29Oct

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South Asia

Myanmar: “Human Rights Champion” Aung San Suu Kyi Jails Dissidents

NOVANEWS By Tony Cartalucci New Eastern Outlook Myanmar’s defacto leader, Aung San Suu Kyi of the National League for Democracy (NDL) political party, has paved her time since coming to power earlier this year with both irony and hypocrisy. She has not only illegally declared herself “leader” of the Southeast Asian state in contravention of its constitution, she has also embarked on an iron-fisted purge of her political opponents identical to the one she fought against as she struggled to seize power to begin with. During elections earlier this year, Myanmar’s constitution prevented Suu Kyi from holding the nation’s highest office due to her inordinate amount of time overseas, her status of having been married to a foreign, and her children’s dual citizenship. Instead of adhering...

3Aug

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South Asia

Bangladesh Terror Attack

NOVANEWS Bangladesh Government Must Take Responsibility For Its Refusal to Tackle Religious Extremism The heinous massacre of diners at a Dhaka cafe by terrorists in the name of Islam has shocked people across the world. The terrorists stormed the café shouting Islamic slogans, and took the diners hostage. They brutally tortured and killed those who failed to or refused to recite verses from the Quran. 20 patrons of the cafe were killed in the bloodbath, and two policemen were also killed. Of the six attackers, five were killed and a sixth has reportedly been arrested. Rival terrorist outfits have claimed responsibility for the attack – Ansar-al-Islam, affiliated to the Al-Qaeda , and the ISIS. From photographers of the attackers posted by the ISIS online, it appears that most of them ar...

13Jul

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South Asia, USA

The US-Led Militarization of Southeast Asia

NOVANEWS China, Russia, North Korea and Iran Are Targets in Pentagon World War III Scenarios Hague Court Ruling against China: A 'Side Show' By Prof Michel Chossudovsky and Sputnik Image: Prof Michel Chossudovsky On Tuesday, the Hague ruled that China has no legal basis for its claims in the South China Sea. Asked to comment, Michel Chossudovsky, the director of the Montreal-based Center for Research on Globalization, told Sputnik that the Hague ‘tempest in a teapot’ is much less worrying than Washington’s efforts to militarize the region. There are two central issues, Professor Chossudovsky explained. “One is the fact that the United States has a project to militarize the Asia Pacific region, specifically threatening China. The other issue are …the [territorial] dispu...