Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon
aims to alert you to the threats and opportunities that China and India present. China and India require serious attention; case of ‘hidden dragon and crouching tiger’.
Without this attention, governments, businesses and, indeed, individuals may find themselves at a great disadvantage sooner rather than later.
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SRINAGAR/NEW DELHI, India (Reuters) – More than two dozen diplomats are visiting Indian-administered Kashmir, New Delhi said on Wednesday, as the country tries to reassure foreign allies following several months of unrest in the contested territory.
The group includes European diplomats, some of whom declined a previous invitation from New Delhi to visit the region. A proposed vote in the European Union parliament next month could chastise India for its actions in Kashmir.
The Muslim-majority Himalayan region is claimed by India and arch-rival Pakistan and has been in turmoil since New Delhi stripped it of special status and clamped down on communication and freedom of movement in August.
India has since eased those restrictions, and restored limited internet connectivity last month, ending one of the world’s longest such shutdowns in a democracy.
But many political leaders, including three former chief ministers of Jammu & Kashmir state, are still in detention without charge six months after the crackdown, and foreign journalists have so far been denied permission to visit the region.
Representatives from countries including Germany, Canada, France, New Zealand, Mexico, Italy, Afghanistan and Austria are on a two-day visit to “witness for themselves the progressive normalisation of the situation,” India’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.
Representatives from several countries, including Germany’s ambassador Walter Lindner, were pictured on a traditional wooden shikara boat on Dal Lake, in Kashmir’s main city of Srinagar.
“We are interacting with the traders, businesswomen and entrepreneurs in Srinagar about the status of business and tourism,” Afghanistan’s envoy Tahir Qadiry said in a tweet on Wednesday.
Sources familiar with the itinerary said the trip will also include meetings with the Indian army and government officials, as well as journalists and civil society groups selected by the security services.
Last month fifteen foreign envoys visited Kashmir – a trip participants characterised as tightly-choreographed with no room for independent meetings.
“Things looked calm, but we only had a very short time out the window of the car to assess the situation,” said a diplomat who attended the previous trip.
“They told the truth, but not necessarily the whole truth,” he added of his meetings with delegates.
Image caption A play staged at Shaheen School has led to the arrest of a parent and a teacher
An Indian school play involving nine to 12-year-olds became the subject of national attention after it landed a young mother and a teacher in jail. BBC Telugu’s Deepthi Bathini reports.
“I’m not sure how I ended up here,” says 26-year-old Nazbunnisa, a single mother who did not give her last name and who works as a domestic help.
She was arrested on 30 January, along with Farida Begum, a teacher at her daughter’s school. The charge against them: sedition, which the women, both Muslim, deny.
They spoke to the BBC in a prison official’s office at Bidar district jail in the southern state of Karnataka. Both were on the verge of tears – they said they are trying to be “strong”, but their lives have suddenly turned “upside down”.
Their bail hearing is scheduled for Tuesday. Their lawyer says the charge of sedition is being misused.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption The citizenship law has sparked huge protests
The two women are accused of spreading “false information” and of “spreading fear among [the] Muslim community” and of using children to insult India’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.
Their ordeal began with a play put on by the students and staff at Shaheen School in Bidar, where Ms Nazbunnisa’s daughter studies and Farida Begum, 52, teaches.
The play was about a controversial new citizenship law, which has polarised India since it was passed in December by the governing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), offers amnesty to non-Muslim immigrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. It sparked fear among India’s 200 million-plus Muslims as it came in the wake of the government’s plans to introduce a National Register of Citizens (or NRC) based on those who can prove their ancestors were Indian citizens.
Authorities are yet to clarify what documents would be needed to prove citizenship, but taken together, the measures have spurred massive protests – critics say the government is marginalising Muslims while offering a path to citizenship for people of other religious communities who fail to make it on to the NRC.
The governing BJP denies these charges, and insists India’s Muslims have nothing to worry about.
So, given the contentious subject, after one of the parents streamed the school play live on Facebook, the recording quickly went viral. Local resident Neelesh Rakshal was among those who watched it.
Mr Rakshal, who describes himself as a social activist, says he became furious over a scene where a man approaches an elderly woman and tells her that Narendra Modi wants Muslims to produce documents proving their Indian citizenship and that of their ancestors, and if they fail to do so, they will be asked to leave the country.
Image caption Mr Rakshal says the play “spreads hatred”
The woman responds that she has been in India for generations and would have to dig up the graves of her ancestors to look for documents. She then says a “boy who was selling tea”, a reference to Mr Modi who has said he used to sell tea as a teenager, is now demanding that she show him her documents.
“I will ask him for his documents and if he doesn’t show them to me, I will hit him with slippers,” she adds.
Mr Rakshal says he immediately registered a police complaint against the school for “using children in a school play to abuse the prime minister and also for spreading hatred”.
The complaint named the school management and the parent who streamed the play. While several members of the school management and the president of the school have also been charged with sedition, police told the court they are still looking for them.
“We do not know for what reason sedition charges have been invoked against the school. It is beyond the imagination of any reasonable person. We will fight it in court,” the school’s CEO, Thouseef Madikeri, says.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption School officials allege that they are being targeted because most of the students are Muslim
Police also questioned students – videos and screen grabs of CCTV footage showing them speaking to students were shared widely on social media, prompting criticism.
Mr Madikeri alleges that on one occasion, police in uniform questioned students, with no child welfare officials present – an accusation denied by police superintendent DL Nagesh.
“The students were questioned five times. It’s mental harassment to students and this may have an impact on them in [the] long run,” Mr Madikeri says.
The Karnataka State Commission for Protection of Child Rights has asked police to explain why they questioned students so many times. Police say it was because not all the students were available at the same time.
Mr Madikeri told the BBC it was the questioning of students that led to the arrest of Farida Begum and Ms Nazbunnisa.
One parent whose child was questioned says she is now scared of going to school.
“My daughter told me police repeatedly asked her to identify the teachers and others who might have taught them the [play’s] dialogues,” he said.
“I do not understand what was wrong in the play. Children have been seeing what has been happening around the country. They picked up the dialogues from social media.”
Image caption Farida Begum’s husband is worried about what will happen
Ms Nazbunnisa is also perplexed as to why she was arrested.
“My daughter was rehearsing for the play at home,” she says. “But I did not know what it was about, or what this controversy about CAA or NRC is about. I did not even go to see her play.”
Ms Nazbunnisa has met her daughter only once since she was jailed: “It was just for a few minutes, and even then only through a window. I held back my tears. I did not want to scare her further.”
The girl is staying with a friends of the family – they told the BBC she is having nightmares and often wakes up crying for her mother.
“She has been pleading that her mother not be punished for her mistake. She is sorry for what has happened,” one of them says.
Farida Begum, who suffers from high blood pressure, says she is “scared of what the future holds”. Her husband, Mirza Baig, says he fears that his wife being in jail will affect his daughter’s marriage prospects.
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India’s ruling party was projected to lose a key state election on Tuesday, the vote count showed, in its first electoral test since deadly anti-government protests erupted nearly two months ago.
The Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi won a bigger majority in a general election in May, but it has lost a string of state elections since then.
The protests, in which at least 25 people have been killed, erupted across the country in mid-December, after the BJP passed a new citizenship law critics say violates India’s secular constitution and discriminates against minority Muslims.
In counting for state polls held in India’s capital New Delhi, data from India’s Election Commission showed the liberal Aam Aadmi Party, led by the city’s chief minister, Arvind Kejriwal, leading 57 out of 70 seats.
The BJP ran a campaign accusing protesters of supporting India’s arch-rival Pakistan and was projected to win 13 seats, up from three in 2015 but far below its own expectations. The party’s local chief Manoj Tiwari had predicted it would win a majority.
AAP activists in distinctive white boat-shaped caps danced outside party headquarters in New Delhi as the result became clear, TV channels showed.
Neelanjan Sircar, an assistant professor at Ashoka University near New Delhi, said that local issues, including delivery of basic services like education and health, appeared to sway voters towards the AAP, even as the BJP ran a polarising campaign on the back of Modi’s image.
“Modi is a larger than life character at the national level, which obviously gives the BJP a huge advantage in national politics,” Sircar said.
“But it doesn’t translate to state level politics, where the BJP often doesn’t have a charismatic face.”
Bespectacled former bureaucrat Kejriwal, 51, formed AAP in 2012 amid an anti-corruption movement that swept India.
The party won a stunning victory in 2015 state elections in the capital, wiping out the BJP and Congress, the party that has ruled India for half its post-independence history.
The Congress – the main opposition at national level – was projected to win no seats in Delhi on Tuesday, data showed, reflecting the deep decline in its fortunes.
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Violent clashes erupted in Delhi between police and hundreds of university students on Friday over the enactment of a new citizenship law that critics say undermines India’s secular foundations.
The unrest has already led Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to cancel a planned visit to India from Sunday.
The new law offers a way to Indian citizenship for six minority religious groups from neighbouring Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan including Hindus and Christians, but not Muslims.
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Police fired tear gas and used baton charges to disperse scores of students demonstrating at Jamia Millia Islamia university in the heart of Delhi over the law.
Protesters attacked cars in the capital, and several people were injured and taken to hospital.
Zakir Riyaz, a PhD student in social work, said the new law made a mockery of India’s religious openness.
“It goes against the whole idea of a secular India,” he said, speaking by phone from the Holy Family Hospital in New Delhi where 15 of his fellow students were admitted after being injured in a police baton charge.
Police barricades were knocked down and streets were strewn with shoes and broken bricks. An official at the university dispensary said that more than 100 students had been brought in with injuries but all had been discharged.
Parvez Hashmi, a local politician who went to the protest site to speak to police, said about 50 students had been detained.
Students said it was meant to be a peaceful protest, with them trying to go from Jamia University to Parliament Street to show their opposition to the legislation. But police pushed them back, leading to clashes.
Critics of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government say it is promoting a Hindu-first agenda for India and that the citizenship law excluding Muslims showed a deep-seated bias against India’s 170 million Muslims.
Imran Chowdhury, a researcher, said “either give citizenship to refugees of all religions or none at all. The constitution is being tampered with in the name of religion.”
Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party denies any religious bias but says it is opposed to the appeasement of one community. It says the new law is meant to help minority groups facing persecution in the three nearby Muslim countries.
ABE CANCELS
The United Nations human rights office voiced concern that the new law is “fundamentally discriminatory in nature”, and called for it to be reviewed.
Two people were killed in India’s Assam state on Thursday when police opened fire on mobs torching buildings and attacking railway stations in protest at the new citizenship rules signed into law on Thursday.
Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe cancelled a trip to Assam for a summit with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi that had been due to begin on Sunday.
Japan has stepped up infrastructure development work in Assam in recent years, which the two sides were expected to highlight during the summit. Abe had also planned to visit a memorial in the nearby state of Manipur where Japanese soldiers were killed in World War Two.
“With reference to the proposed visit of Japanese PM Abe Shinzo to India, both sides have decided to defer the visit to a mutually convenient date in the near future,” Indian foreign ministry spokesman Raveesh Kumar said in a tweet.
Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said both countries would decide on the appropriate timing for the visit although nothing has been decided yet.
A movement against immigrants from Bangladesh has raged in Assam for decades. Protesters there say granting Indian nationality to more people will further strain the state’s resources and lead to the marginalisation of indigenous communities.
“The central government and I are totally committed to constitutionally safeguard the political, linguistic, cultural and land rights of the Assamese people,” he tweeted.
However, with internet and mobile services shut down, it is unlikely residents would have been able to read the message.
The chief minister of Assam was stranded at the airport for several hours on Wednesday because roads were blocked by protests.
What do protesters want?
They want the bill to be repealed, as they say their ethnic and cultural identity is under threat from illegal migration.
Essentially, they do not want any migrants – regardless of religion – to be allowed into the state.
The National Register of Citizens (NRC) is a list of people who can prove they came to the state by 24 March 1971, a day before neighbouring Bangladesh became an independent country.
In the run-up to its publication, the BJP had supported the NRC, but changed tack days before the final list was published, saying it was error-ridden.
The reason for that was a lot of Bengali Hindus – a strong voter base for the BJP – were left off the list, and would possibly become illegal immigrants.
The CAB is seen as being linked to the register, although it is not the same thing.
It will help protect non-Muslims who are excluded from the register and face the threat of deportation or internment.
Has the bill been challenged?
The Indian Union Muslim League, a political party, has petitioned the country’s top court to declare the bill illegal.
In their petition to the Supreme Court, the Indian Union Muslim League argued that the bill violated articles of equality, fundamental rights and the right to life.
URUMQI, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) — Rich in resources but remote, Xinjiang in China’s far west has become a magnet for investors for its unique position on the Silk Road.
In a workshop of the Amer International Group in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, workers are busy adjusting and packing laptops.
Recently, Amer sent the first batch of 2,000 laptops it produced for the German company TrekStor to the European market via China-Europe freight trains.
Headquartered in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, Amer invested 20 billion yuan (around 2.8 billion U.S. dollars) to build an industrial park in Xinjiang in 2018. So far, the industrial park has produced and exported around 1.5 million mobile phones, according to Wang Wenyin, the founder and chairman of Amer International Group.
“We saw Xinjiang’s geographical advantages, so we established the industrial park and cooperated with our counterparts in South and Central Asia in the fields of smartphones and IT high-end manufacturing,” Wang said.
Amer International Group is among a growing number of enterprises that have been attracted by Xinjiang in recent years, as trains and planes have made Xinjiang better connected than ever before.
As China’s key trade gateway to Central and West Asia, the remote region’s position as the heart of the Belt and Road Initiative is unmistakable. In 2013, China proposed the BRI, which opened up new space for the world economy, spurring trade and economic growth and stimulating investment and creating jobs worldwide.
Urumqi Customs saw the number of China-Europe freight trains skyrocket to 5,743 in the first 10 months this year, up 53.68 percent year on year, outnumbering the total of 2018.
To attract more investors, the local government has gone to great lengths creating a more friendly business environment, such as cutting the time required for starting a business and lowering the entry threshold for products.
Up to now, Xinjiang has had more than 1.8 million market entities including 359,000 enterprises, up 18 percent year on year.
Foreign and domestic business giants including German chemical giant BASF and China’s real estate conglomerates Wanda Group have also invested in the region.
Lai Naixiang, head of Kashgar Oumeisheng Energy Technology, a home appliance manufacturer, moved his business from Shenzhen to Kashgar in southern Xinjiang in 2017.
“We chose to settle in Kashgar because of the great market potential in adjacent Central Asian countries as well as Xinjiang’s lower electricity prices and preferential tax policy,” he said.
Last year, the company exported electric kettles worth more than 16 million yuan to Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
Foreign trade in Xinjiang has seen booming growth. The region recorded around 131.5 billion yuan in imports and exports in the first 10 months of this year, up 28 percent year on year.
In the first 10 months, Kazakhstan topped the list of Xinjiang’s major trade partners, with trade volume between the two growing by 28.2 percent to 60.2 billion yuan.
Xinjiang’s trade with Kyrgyzstan, Australia, Pakistan, Britain, Argentina and Vietnam also showed fast growth, according to the local customs authorities.
“With further Belt and Road construction, Xinjiang will get more impetus in economic and social development. I see great potential in the region,” Wang said.
According to the 2019 Global Diplomacy Index, released by the Lowy Institute in Australia on Wednesday, China has 276 embassies, consulates and other missions globally, surpassing the US with 273 missions. France was third on 267.
Bonnie Bley, the index report’s lead researcher, said that while a country’s total did not equate to diplomatic influence, “diplomatic infrastructure is still important”
“China’s newly held lead serves as a telling metric of national ambition and international priorities,” Bley said.
Beijing has 169 embassies or high commissions, while Washington has 168. However, China had 96 consulates while the US had 88, suggesting that Beijing’s diplomatic expansion was closely linked to its economic interests, she said.
Beijing bulks up diplomacy budget as China extends global reach
Renmin University international relations professor Shi Yinhong said China had close and growing trade and investment ties with many developing countries, especially those taking part in the Belt and Road Initiative, increasing the need for consulates.
“One of the consulates’ main goals is to serve the citizens and businesses located in those countries,” Shi said.
Beijing has also expanded its reach at Taipei’s expense. Since 2016, when the index was first published, Taiwan’s total number of embassies fell from 22 to 15, the biggest drop among the 61 places ranked.
China opened five new embassies – in El Salvador, Burkina Faso, Gambia, São Tomé and Príncipe and the Dominican Republic – countries that severed official diplomatic ties with Taiwan. This directly contributed to China’s lead over the US, the report said.
Beijing’s diplomatic expansion also comes as the US, under the administration of President Donald Trump, is taking an “America first” approach to foreign policy.
Sri Lanka rejects fears of China’s ‘debt-trap diplomacy’ in belt and road projects
Trump has sought to cut funding to the US State Department and the White House has not appointed US ambassadors for at least 17 countries, including Brazil and Egypt, according to the American Foreign Service Association.
“Even though the US has a strong diplomatic base but it is not so proactive any more. It has fewer consulates and fewer foreign service workers,” Shi said.
“For the long term, China is in a more advantageous position.”
But a country’s diplomatic ability and influence did not rest on the number of foreign service postings and the US still held more international diplomatic sway than China, he added.
Some of China’s biggest diplomatic missions include Islamabad in Pakistan, Washington and London.
Image copyright AFPCelebrations have taken place in India and Pakistan to mark the 550th anniversary of the birth of Guru Nanak – the founder of Sikhism.
The anniversary comes just a few days after the historic opening of the Kartarpur corridor, which allows Indians access to one of Sikhism’s holiest shrines in Pakistan without having to apply for a visa.
Tensions between the neighbours have made it difficult for Indian pilgrims to visit the site in Pakistan in recent years. But an agreement reached last month allows Indians to make the 4km (2.5-mile) crossing to the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib Kartarpur – where Guru Nanak spent the last 18 years of his life.
On Tuesday, Sikh pilgrims in Pakistan gathered at Nankana Sahib, the birth place of Guru Nanak, which is about 80km (50 miles) from the city of Lahore.
Image copyright AFP
Large numbers of devotees, including women, took part in the religious rituals.
Image copyright AFP
The auspicious day for Sikhs was also marked in India, where Guru Nanak’s birth anniversary is an annual public holiday.
Image copyright AFPSikh devotees gathered in huge numbers at the Bangla Sahib Gurdwara in the capital Delhi.Image copyright AFP
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi greeted the nation on the occasion, saying it was “a day to rededicate ourselves” to Guru Nanak’s “dream of a just, inclusive and harmonious society”.
Though Guru Nanak’s anniversary is an important event for Sikhs annually, this time the celebrations were more special due to the opening of the Kartarpur corridor.
Devotees from across the world visit the Kartarpur shrine every year to commemorate his birth. Indian Sikhs will now be able to visit with just their passports, but they will not be allowed to leave the site or stay overnight.
The Golden Temple in Amritsar, in north-western India, is the holiest Gurdwara (where Sikhs worship). On the eve of the anniversary, it was lit up to host processions as Sikh worshippers took part in the three-day celebration of Guru Nanak’s birth.
Image copyright REUTERSOn the first day of the celebrations, Sikhs read the Sikh holy book – the Guru Granth Sahib – from beginning to end.
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India and Pakistan are set to sign an agreement on Indian pilgrims visiting a Sikh shrine in Pakistan, rare cooperation between the nuclear-armed neighbours at a time of tension that has brought exchanges of fire on their disputed border.
The pact will introduce visa-free access from India to the Pakistani town of Kartarpur, home to a temple that marks the site where the founder of Sikhism, Guru Nanak, died.
India’s foreign ministry said in a statement late on Monday an understanding had been reached on most issues and India was prepared to sign the agreement on Wednesday.
Pakistani officials were not immediately available for comment but Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper cited a foreign ministry spokesman as saying agreement had been reached and the two sides would sign the pact soon.
The Sikh minority in India has long sought easier access to the temple in Kartarpur, which is just over the border in Muslim-majority Pakistan.
The collaboration comes at a time of tension between the rivals, with Pakistan particularly aggrieved over recent Indian government measures in its part of the divided Muslim-majority region of Kashmir.
Both countries claim the Himalayan region in full but rule it in part.
India in August revoked special autonomy in Indian-controlled Kashmir, which was accompanied by a crackdown on dissent by India’s security forces there, angering Pakistan.
The dispute over Kashmir has bedevilled relations since their independence in 1947 and sparked two of their three wars.
India said on Sunday two soldiers and a civilian were killed in cross-border shelling in Kashmir while Pakistan said one of its soldiers and three civilians had been killed.
In February, they came close to war following a suicide bombing in Indian Kashmir that killed 40 paramilitary soldiers. In response, India launched an air strike on the Pakistani side and Pakistan shot down an Indian aircraft.
The new crossing will be inaugurated in early November, just before the 550th birthday of Sikhism’s founder on Nov. 12, officials from both sides have said.
The shrine is about 4 km (2-1/2 miles) from the border. The crossing and corridor, including a road, bridge over the Ravi River and immigration office, will replace a drawn-out visa process and circuitous journey through Pakistan.
But there is still disagreement over a $20 fee that Pakistan wants to charge each visitor.
India “has consistently urged Pakistan that in deference to the wishes of the pilgrims, it should not levy such a fee”, India’s foreign ministry said.
SRINAGAR, India (Reuters) – India and Pakistan blamed one another for cross-border shelling in the disputed Kashmir region which killed and injured soldiers and civilians on both sides and made it one of the deadliest days since New Delhi revoked Kashmir’s special status in August.
India said there was heavy shelling by Pakistan across the border in northern Kashmir’s Tangdhar region late on Saturday night, killing two Indian soldiers and one civilian. Islamabad said one of its soldiers and three civilians died after India violated the ceasefire, according to the spokesman for the Pakistani Armed Forces.
Kashmir has been a disputed subject between the two nuclear-armed neighbours since they both got independence in 1947, and they have fought two of their three wars over the region.
Tensions between the two countries have flared and there has been intermittent cross-border firing since Aug. 5 when New Delhi flooded Indian Kashmir with troops to quell unrest after it revoked the region’s special autonomous status.
Islamabad has warned that changing Kashmir’s status would escalate tensions but India says the withdrawal of special status is an internal affair and is aimed at faster economic development of the territory.
Reuters was unable to independently verify the claims made by both sides on the shelling, which marks an escalation from the small arms fire usually exchanged by the two armies.
There was an unprovoked ceasefire violation by Pakistan, said Indian defence spokesman Colonel Rajesh Kalia.
“Our troops retaliated strongly causing heavy damage and casualties to the enemy,” Kalia said.
An Indian army source said the shelling was cover to assist militants enter India because of which a “calibrated escalation of area weapons was undertaken”. The Indian army “retains the right to respond at a time and place of it’s choosing” if the Pakistani army continues to do this, he said.
Pakistan, meanwhile, also claimed that India’s attack was unprovoked and deliberately targeted at civilians.
Major General Asif Ghafoor, a spokesman for the Pakistan Armed Forces, said Pakistan responded “effectively,” killing 9 Indian soldiers, injuring several others and destroying 2 bunkers.
“The Indian army shall always get a befitting response,” he said.
Indian forces in Kashmir have gone “berserk”, Raja Farooq Haider, prime minister of Pakistan’s Azad Kashmir region, said, adding that six civilians died and 8 were injured.
“This is the height of savagery. The world must not stay silent over it. #KashmirNeedsAttention,” he said in a tweet.
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 