The blast took place near Beijing and is the latest in a string of incidents often blamed on lax safety standards.
At least one person has been killed and 22 injured after a suspected gas explosion at a restaurant in northern China.
The blast took place just before 8am (00:00 GMT) on Tuesday in the city of Sanhe, less than 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of the capital, Beijing.
The explosion was suspected to have been caused by a gas leak at a fried chicken shop, state broadcaster CCTV reported, adding that the injured had been taken to hospital.
China has seen a series of deadly accidents in recent months, often caused by lax safety standards and poor enforcement.
Rescue workers rushed to the scene of the Sanhe explosion, with the local Langfang fire service saying 36 emergency vehicles and 154 personnel had been dispatched.
Police cordoned off streets, and directed people away from the area.
“The fire is currently under effective control, and rescue work is being carried out urgently,” it said.
Footage captured by a dashcam shows the panic after the explosion [Reuters]
Video clips on the Chinese social media platform Weibo showed destroyed building facades, many mangled cars, and glass littering surrounding streets. Some objects were on fire.
Another video on Chinese social media that was verified by the AFP news agency showed what appeared to be a building that had completely collapsed, and debris strewn across the street.
Last month, at least 15 people were killed and 44 injured in a fire at a residential building in the eastern city of Nanjing.
In January, dozens died after a fire broke out at a shop in the central city of Xinyu, with state news agency Xinhua reporting the blaze had been caused by the “illegal” use of fire by workers in the store’s basement.
That fire took place just days after a blaze at a school in central Henan province killed 13 schoolchildren as they slept in a dormitory.
Domestic media reports suggested the fire was caused by an electric heating device.
National People’s Congress discusses future of nation amid increasingly turbulent geopolitics.
China’s plans for the coming year have been set out at its National People’s Congress.
The country is aiming for the same modest economic growth as it did last year, but its economy is facing several challenges, and geopolitical tensions are rising.
That makes the fortunes of the planet’s second largest economy of global interest – as are its political intentions.
So what’s in store for China – and the rest of the world?
Presenter: Jonah Hull
Guests:
Einar Tangen – senior fellow at the Taihe Institute, Beijing
Bert Hofman – professor at the East Asian Institute of the National University of Singapore
Vicky Pryce – chief economic adviser at the Centre for Economics and Business Research, London
Baek Won-soon was detained in Vladivostok earlier this year – the latest foreign national to be imprisoned in Russia.
Russia has detained a South Korean in the country’s east, accusing him of spying.
Citing the authorities, the Russian state-run TASS news agency identified the man as Baek Won-soon and said he had been detained in the city of Vladivostok “at the start of the year”, before being transferred to Moscow for “investigative actions” at the end of last month.
Baek, whose case has been classified as “top secret”, is being held in Lefortovo Prison, where a court on Monday ordered his detention to be extended until June 15, TASS said.
The agency cited an unnamed law enforcement official as saying Baek had passed on information “constituting state secrets to foreign intelligence services.” No further details were made public.
South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement its consulate had been providing assistance since it became aware that Baek had been detained. It declined to give more details on the matter citing the ongoing investigation.
The Yonhap news agency’s Korean service said Baek was a missionary who had been involved in rescuing North Korean defectors and providing humanitarian aid. He was detained in January a few days after arriving in Vladivostok by land from China, the agency added.
The incident marks the first time a South Korean has been detained in Russia on spying charges.
Russia labelled South Korea an “unfriendly” country in 2022 because of its support for Western sanctions against Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.
Russia has also deepened relations with North Korea after leader Kim Jong Un travelled to Russia last September and met Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The United States and others have accused North Korea of providing weapons to Russia for use in its war in Ukraine in exchange for technological know-how to advance Pyongyang’s military modernisation programme.
Both countries have denied the allegations.
Over the past year, Russia has detained multiple foreign nationals and accused them of committing various offences.
US journalist Evan Gershkovich was detained for alleged espionage in March 2023 and is also being held at Lefortovo prison, which is notorious for its harsh conditions and keeping detainees in near-total isolation. His detention has been extended until the end of March with court proceedings held behind closed doors.
In October, Russian-US journalist Alsu Kurmasheva was detained for failing to register as a foreign agent and later charged with spreading “false information” about the Russian military. Her detention has been extended until April.
Espionage carries a maximum jail term of 20 years in Russia.
Gershkovich and Kurmasheva both deny the charges against them.
China’s week-long meeting of the National People’s Congress (NPC), which gathered some 3,000 delegates from the political, business and cultural elite in Beijing, has closed without the customary press conference by the country’s premier.
The annual meeting of the country’s parliament began on March 4 at the Great Hall of the People in Tiananmen Square, with delegates tasked with approving new laws and political appointments as well as assessing a litany of reports from departments across the government.
Since 1993, proceedings have wrapped with a press conference by the country’s premier but it was announced last week that Li Qiang would not be speaking to journalists.
If he had, he might have been able to give some insight into the legislation NPC delegates approved, including a shift towards “future industries” and a focus on national security.
Here are five key takeaways from this year’s formalities.
Open to AI
Facial recognition scanners at the entrance to the NPC offered delegates an idea of what a “future industries”-focused economy might look like.
Military delegates arrive at the closing session of the 14th National People’s Congress (NPC) at the Great Hall of the People [Wang Zhao/AFP]
Inside, Premier Li Qiang’s Government Work Report detailed how new technologies – from electric vehicles to commercial space flights – could help China’s economy escape the weight of a faltering property market.
“The two sessions clearly conveyed China’s intention to focus on the development of new technology in order to achieve self-sufficiency,” Angela Zhang, an associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong, told Al Jazeera.
“China is driven by a sense of urgency to catch up with the United States,” said Zhang, who is also the author of High Wire: How China Regulates Big Tech and Governs Its Economy.
To meet potential economic growth through new technologies, Zhang told Al Jazeera she believes “the Chinese government will adopt a relatively lenient approach towards regulating new technologies like AI”.
Future Industries
While facial recognition cameras indicate that China could join Israel and the US in the lucrative market of surveillance technology, Bert Hofman, a professor at the East Asian Institute of the National University of Singapore, sees a range of ways in which new technologies could help China escape recent economic woes.
Security cameras near the Great Hall of the People at Tiananmen Square [Bloomberg/Getty Images]
While China is “on track” to meet its climate targets by 2060, Hofman says it could potentially see economic benefits from “front-loading” its green transition sooner as has also been argued by Martin Wolf, the chief economics commentator at the Financial Times.
For example, Hofman told Al Jazeera that the government could give “subsidies to households to buy more of the outputs of China’s surging EV [electric vehicle] manufacturing”.
Defence and security
The government did not announce a specific target for spending on its green transition at the NPC.
By contrast, it did announce that defence spending would rise by 7.2 percent in 2024, the same level of increase as in 2023.
A spokesperson explaining the increase said: “China has maintained a comparatively low military expenditure and the nation always sticks to a peaceful development road”.
But references to peace were notably absent from sections of the premier’s work report in its references to Taiwan. Last year’s report called for “advanc[ing] the process of China’s peaceful reunification”, while this year, Li said China would “be firm in advancing the cause of China’s reunification”.
According to Hofman, the increase in China’s military spending announced at the NPC may not result in an increase in real terms.
He told Al Jazeera he is more concerned about the focus on “future industries and the industrial policy that will go into developing them in China” after the focus on this area at this year’s NPC.
Still, China’s military spending has attracted much attention given that other countries are already spending more on defence.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), other countries, including the US, Japan, Australia and South Korea, have increased military spending “driven by a perception of a growing threat from China”.
Beijing’s defence budget has more than doubled since 2015 but, according to William D Hartung of the Quincy Institute, the US continues to outspend China on its military by a substantial margin.
Hartung cites data from SIPRI which he says go beyond China’s official military expenditures to include the “full range of China’s military-related activities”. Even taking this into account, according to the latest SIPRI estimate, US military spending at $877bn was about three times higher than Chinese military spending at $292bn in 2022.
Difficult economic questions
Speaking to delegates, some ministers were relatively frank about the challenges China is facing, especially in the area of economic growth.
Housing Minister Ni Hong was quoted as describing the task of fixing China’s property market as “very difficult”.
The collapse of property developer Evergrande was potentially a touchy subject at the meeting with one journalist reportedly having been questioned about her ties to the company after going through a facial recognition scanner.
China’s target of 5 percent growth for 2024 was seen by some as “ambitious”, although Hofman sees it as relatively realistic if China is able to escape a potential “deflationary spiral”.
He says Beijing has been wary of stimulus tied to the flailing housing market but that there are other ways it could help get more money into people’s hands to help stimulate the economy, such as a recent “very minimal” increase in rural pensions of about 20 Chinese yuan ($2.78) per month.
Delegates at the NPC go through previously agreed documents “almost line by line” meaning there are few, if any, new announcements during official proceedings, said Hofman.
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi held a rare press conference on the sidelines of the NPC [Pedro Pardo/AFP]
The Financial Times reported that officials from some of China’s indebted state provinces met state bankers on the sidelines of the Congress.
Looking outwards
Without the customary press conference, China removed one of the few avenues open to foreign media trying to understand where China sees itself in the world.
However, while Li did not address the media, Foreign Minister Wang Yi held a press conference last week on the sidelines of the NPC.
The room was full and Wang fielded questions from reporters from publications in countries including Egypt, Russia and the US.
Wang said there had been “some improvement in China-US relations” since Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Joe Biden met in San Francisco last year, after a deterioration of ties as a result of differences over issues from trade to Taiwan and an alleged Chinese spy balloon.
Asked about China’s relationship with Russia in light of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, he described Beijing and Moscow’s closer relationship as a “strategic choice”, noting that bilateral trade had reached a record $240bn in 2023.
“New opportunities” lay ahead, he added, portraying the two countries’ ties as a “new paradigm” in the relations between big powers.
“Major countries should not seek conflict and the Cold War should not be allowed to come back,” Wang said.
Wang Yi also took questions on Israel’s war on Gaza, calling for an immediate ceasefire and telling journalists that China would support Palestine’s “full” membership of the United Nations.
The aggressive postures of disruptive states drove arms sales in Europe, the Middle East and Asia during the past five years, according to a new report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
Russia’s war in Ukraine contributed to a doubling of arms purchases in Europe in 2019-23 relative to 2014-18, the think tank said on Monday, with Ukraine becoming the largest regional importer and fourth-largest in the world.
Arms exports to Asia made up the largest single chunk globally – 37 percent – with United States allies Japan, Australia and India leading the buying spree.
These were “largely driven by one key factor: concern over China’s ambitions”, said Pieter Wezeman, a senior researcher at SIPRI’s arms transfers programme.
Japan, for example, raised its imports two-and-a-half times over, ordering, among other things, 400 long-range missiles capable of reaching North Korea and China.
US allies Qatar, Egypt and Saudi Arabia also led purchases in the Middle East, which accounted for 30 percent of global imports.
“It is not just a fear of Iran. It is actually warfare,” Wezeman told Al Jazeera. “In the past 10 years, Saudi Arabia has actually used those arms in operations which it is leading by itself, including in Yemen. That is considered in Saudi Arabia a direct confrontation with Iran through proxies.”
Regional rivalry also played a role.
Qatar, for instance, quadrupled its arms imports after Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates imposed a blockade on the Gulf country in 2017, ordering combat aircraft from the US, France and the United Kingdom.
“We live in a transitional world. It is fluid and unstable. The UN has a decorative role. There is a whole class of revisionist powers,” professor of history at the American College of Greece Konstantinos Filis told Al Jazeera.
“There is insecurity from Western-friendly states about whether US power can deter an attack on them,” Filis said. “They’re saying, ‘If I don’t rearm, there is no one to protect me, there aren’t multilateral strong mechanisms as in previous years, so I have to prepare for a future attack’.”
US widens lead as top exporter
Western allies are the biggest exporters, too.
The surge in spending by allies helped the US widen its lead as a top arms exporter, reaching 42 percent of the global market, up from 34 percent in 2013-18.
That is partly because the US is the only country with an exportable fifth-generation combat aircraft, the F-35 Lightning II, and many of its allies are now transitioning their air forces to adopt the aircraft’s stealth technology. Europe has almost 800 next-generation fighter planes on order, including the F-35, the Eurofighter Typhoon and France’s Rafale.
But the pattern of upticks in sales to key Western allies, comprising eight of the top 10 arms importers, suggests the bigger reasons are political.
Other Western arms producers have also benefitted. France raised exports almost by half to beat Russia to second place, and Italy nearly doubled them.
Fighter planes have swollen France’s orderbook, with Dassault going from selling 23 Rafale 4.5th generation aircraft in the 2013-18 period to 94 in the past five years. It currently has 193 on order.
In fact, Europe, including the UK and Switzerland, exported 31 percent of the world’s weapons in 2019-23.
South Korea has emerged as a major exporter too, signing big deals with Poland for tanks, artillery, aircraft, and rocket artillery.
China, in contrast, sold 5.8 percent, with 60 percent of its exports going to Pakistan, and most of the rest to Bangladesh and Thailand.
Russia, once the US’s great rival in arms sales, halved its exports to 11 percent of the global share – partly due to husbanding its resources to fight Ukraine, but also due to a longer decline predating its full-scale invasion.
Russian exports have been falling partly because China, a major client since the 1990s, has increasingly been building its own weapons, and India, a long-term buyer of Russian weapons, is beginning to question Russia’s technologies and ability to deliver.
“India seems to be moving away from Russian equipment,” said Wezeman. “There have been some orders that haven’t led to deliveries yet, for example, the nuclear powered submarine which Russia is supposed to deliver this year or next, some frigates, a few aircraft.”
“We also see what seems to be a disappointment on the Indian side about the technical level of the Russian equipment which they have acquired, and therefore a shift to other suppliers such as France and Israel in the past 20 years, and the US.”
A hopeful sign for Europe
It is a hopeful sign, say experts, that Europe has begun to rekindle the forges of its own defence industry, giving it greater agency to supply Ukraine – especially given delays in US military aid.
“It is very clear that Europe is putting in an enormous effort to scale up its production of ammunition and a whole range of other products,” said Wezeman. “It turns out, there is capacity, but of course it is scattered throughout Europe. Much of it has been standing still. There is expertise, there are production lines lying dormant,” he said.
“It’s only when things get really bad that people mobilise,” Suzanne Raine, a former UK diplomat and lecturer at Cambridge University’s Centre for Geopolitics, told Al Jazeera.
“There was a moment at the beginning when Russia invaded and it looked terrible and there was an immediate response,” she said, referring to the first rush of weapons pledges for Ukraine in early 2022.
She believed that Ukrainian success was misinterpreted in the West.
“That moment when it became clear that Ukraine was actually going to be able to hold the Russians back was a dangerous turning point, because it allowed for the first little bit of complacency,” she said.
French President Emmanuel Macron last May called for greater European defence autonomy. Not everyone agrees with that framing of the debate.
“The defence industrial partnerships that protect European nations and support Ukraine cross European boundaries,” Cambridge University historian Hugo Bromley told Al Jazeera.
“Ultimately, the goal should be less about ‘European autonomy’, and more about developing capabilities at national and international levels among friends and allies.
“We mustn’t let the pursuit of ‘European autonomy’ get in the way of providing the best support we can,” he said.
Carey shared 140-run partnership with Marsh as Australia won the second Test by three wickets in a tense finish.
Alex Carey scored an unbeaten 98 and shared a 140-run partnership with Mitch Marsh to drive Australia to a three-wicket win in the second Test and a 2-0 sweep of the series over New Zealand in Christchurch.
The contest played out on a relatively mild fourth-day pitch on Monday and both sides had moments when they took control. But it was Marsh’s innings of 80 and Carey’s steady hand which guided Australia to victory.
Wicketkeeper Carey then teamed up with captain Pat Cummins as Australia chased down their 279-run victory target before tea on day four.
“It was pretty tense,” said Cummins, who scored 32 not out and hit the winning runs with a four to the point boundary.
“I think the story of this series was in key moments, someone stood up and made themselves a match-winner so yeah, [we] keep finding ways to win. It’s a pretty awesome squad.”
New Zealand, chasing a first home Test win over their neighbours in 31 years, had put the tourists on the back foot with four wickets in the last 90 minutes of play on day three.
After rain delayed the start of day four for an hour, skipper Tim Southee struck with the eighth delivery to dismiss Travis Head for 18 and reduce the tourists to 80-5.
In retrospect, however, Rachin Ravindra fumbling a straightforward catch that would have sent back Marsh for 28 off the previous delivery was perhaps the more significant moment.
“I think whenever you’ve finished a close game you always look back on a number of things,” said Southee, who with fellow stalwart Kane Williamson was playing his 100th Test.
“This morning was always going to be a crucial period with the ball still reasonably new, and we were able to beat the bat a few times but they were able to weather that storm.”
The defeat left the Black Caps with just one Test win in 24 attempts against their closest rivals this century, while Australia will now move above them into second place in the World Test Championships standings behind India.
Carey was denied his second Test century but cared little as he and his captain steered their side to their target 281-7 and a sixth win in seven Tests over the Australasian summer.
“I was happy with that,” Carey said. “I didn’t want to be on strike again. It was a great series and this match ebbed and flowed. We had our backs against the wall this morning, they came out and put us under the pump so it’s nice to chase those runs down.”
Carey, who also took 10 catches over New Zealand’s two innings to match Adam Gilchrist’s Australian record, said Australia “stayed resilient” despite the early pressure.
“Everyone’s had their moments and it’s a really special team we’re playing in.”
New Zealand seamer Matt Henry was named Player of the Series for his 17 wickets over the two matches, the first of which finished with Australian victors by 172 runs in Wellington.
The world’s second-largest economy is facing challenges, including an ailing housing market and weak domestic demand.
China’s leaders are wrapping up a weeklong key conclave at which they admitted more was needed to revive a sluggish economy battered by an ailing housing market, poor domestic demand and record-high youth unemployment figures.
Top officials have been upfront about the myriad challenges China is facing, admitting that a modest 5 percent growth goal will not be easy and that “hidden risks” are dragging the economy down.
But details of how they plan to tackle the problems have been scant. They have also simultaneously moved to deepen powers to deal with threats to their rule and tightened a veil of secrecy around policymaking, scrapping a traditional annual news conference and promising to include national security provisions into a raft of new laws.
Monday morning saw lawmakers meet for more closed-door deliberations before a closing session and a vote by the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s parliament, at 3pm (07:00 GMT).
Among the legislation voted on will be a revision to the Organic Law of the State Council, China’s cabinet, which state media have said will aim to deepen the “leadership” of the ruling Communist Party over the government.
The tightly choreographed event caps a week of high-level meetings that have been dominated by the economy, which last year posted some of its slowest growth in years.
On Saturday, ministers pledged to do more to boost employment and stabilise the country’s troubled property market.
“Workers face some challenges and problems in employment, and more effort needs to be made to stabilise employment,” Wang Xiaoping, minister of human resources and social security, told a news conference.
Housing Minister Ni Hong said fixing the property market, which long accounted for around a quarter of China’s economy, remained “very difficult”.
But despite official pledges of support, analysts say they are yet to see the kinds of big-ticket bailouts the flagging economy needs if it is to rebound.
“Reviving the economy requires boosting household wealth and income, something China’s leaders clearly aren’t yet ready to do,” said analysts at Trivium, a research firm specialising in China, in a note.
Throughout the “Two Sessions”, officials have appeared reluctant to face questioning about the myriad economic headwinds China is confronting.
Last week, they broke a decades-long tradition by scrapping a news conference by the premier – long a rare chance for foreign media to question the country’s number two official.
The topic was swiftly removed from search results on Chinese social media giant Weibo, as was a hashtag declaring “middle-class children have no future”.
Lawmakers have also said they will adopt wide-ranging security laws in 2024 to “resolutely safeguard” the country’s sovereignty, further expanding the Communist Party’s powers to punish threats to its rule.
Ko Naing* is just the sort of young man Myanmar’s military is looking for.
Hoping to make up for recruitment shortfalls and battlefield losses against armed groups fighting to reverse its 2021 coup, Myanmar’s military last month announced plans to enforce a years-old conscription law.
Starting in April, the military says, all men aged 18 to 35 years and women from 18 to 27 years must serve at least two years in the armed forces.
Doctors and other professionals in especially short supply in the military’s ranks may be drafted until they are 45 years old. The country’s military rulers hope to call up approximately 60,000 recruits by the end of the year.
As a doctor, and at a healthy 33 years old, Ko Naing fits the bill for conscription.
Like many of Myanmar’s young men and women, Ko Naing said he had no intention of answering the call and would instead do whatever it takes to avoid the draft.
“The one sure thing is I won’t serve. If I’m drafted by the military, I will try to move to the remote areas or to another country,” Ko Naing told Al Jazeera from Myanmar.
“Not only me, I think everyone in Myanmar is not willing to serve in the military under the conscription law,” he said. “The people believe it is not legal because the people believe the military is not their government.”
The 2021 coup that removed the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi has plunged Myanmar into a brutal civil war pitting the military against a patchwork of deep-rooted, well-armed ethnic minority armies and a new crop of local armed groups set up to remove the military regime from power.
Having already stretched the military thin across the country, these ethnic armies have forced the military to retreat from dozens of towns and bases since October, mainly in the east. The six-month-old campaign, dubbed Operation 1027, has handed the ruling generals their worst string of defeats of the war.
“The timing of the activation of the conscription law indicates its desperation,” said Ye Myo Hein, an adviser to the US Institute of Peace and fellow at the Wilson Center in Washington, DC.
“Following Operation 1027, the junta has faced continuous and significant military losses, resulting in a substantial depletion of its human resources and a serious shortage of manpower. In response to this situation, the military has opted to activate the conscription law to replenish its declining manpower,” Ye Myo Hein said.
He also doubts the draft will do the military much good. The intake of recruits may help boost the morale of commanders on the front lines running short of soldiers, Ye Myo Hein said, but is unlikely to stem the military’s losses.
“The new recruits may not be effective fighters in the short term. If deployed on the battlefronts, they could end up as cannon fodder,” he said.
Ye Myo Hein said the draft could also backfire on the military by filling its ranks with resentful soldiers who could pose a threat from within, and by driving more young people into the arms of the resistance.
Members of the People’s Defence Forces, who became rebel fighters after protests against the military coup in Myanmar were met with extreme violence [File: Reuters]
‘No one … is safe’
The military says the draft will start next month with an initial batch of 5,000 conscripts. Unofficially, though, it may have started already.
In a recent statement, the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, Tom Andrews, relayed reports of young men being effectively “kidnapped” off the streets by the military and forced to the front lines.
The New Myanmar Foundation, a charity based in Thailand helping those fleeing the war, says it has also heard of soldiers and police raiding teashops across the country in recent weeks in search of young men and women to press them into service.
“They are now losing, so they need the youth to fight for them,” the foundation’s executive director, Sann Aung, told Al Jazeera from the Thai border town of Mae Sot.
A camp for internally displaced people in Myanmar as seen across the Moei River from Mae Sot in western Thailand [Jintamas Saksornchai/AP Photo]
Activists, journalists and others in the military’s crosshairs have been fleeing the country – many of them by irregular means – amid a crackdown on critics and dissidents since the coup in February 2021. Now it is feared that the new conscription drive will turn a stream of political migrants into a flood.
In his statement, UN rapporteur Andrews warned that the numbers leaving Myanmar would “surely skyrocket” because of the draft.
Ye Myo Hein also warned of a “mass exodus”.
“People living in urban areas have been attempting to normalise their lives amidst the post-coup abnormality to some extent. However, the conscription law unequivocally gives the signal that no one, even those outside conflict zones, is exempt from the repercussions of the military coup and is safe,” he said.
Sann Aung said he has already seen the numbers fleeing to the Thai border swell and echoed the forecasts of a growing surge.
He said many travel to the relative safety of Myanmar’s rugged and remote borderlands, where some of the country’s strongest ethnic armies have over the decades carved out enclaves largely independent of the central government. Some go to join the fight against the military, others just to hide.
“This is the cheapest and the most convenient way for them,” Sann Aung said. “But some people who [may] have more … money and cash, they move to the neighbouring areas, neighbouring countries, including Thailand and India and maybe China.”
He and other close observers say that most of those fleeing are heading to Thailand, drawn by a large diaspora from Myanmar from before the coup, as well as better job prospects and a government in Bangkok that has kept Myanmar’s military at a distance — at least compared with China and India, which have been arming the generals.
Phoe Thingyan of the Overseas Irrawaddy Association, another charity for the displaced based in Mae Sot on the Thai border, said since news of the conscription plan emerged, the numbers arriving at the border or crossing over have been “increasing every day”.
‘Legally or illegally’
Overwhelmed by a recent surge of visa applicants at its embassy in Myanmar, Thailand has capped the number of people allowed to apply for an entry visa per day at 400. Even after doubling that daily limit to 800, application places have filled up for weeks ahead.
Newly desperate to get travel documents to leave the country, hundreds of people swarmed a passport office in Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city, on February 19, and accidentally killed two queue tokens vendors in the crush.
People wait in line to enter the Thai embassy visa application section in Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city, last month [AP Photo]
Phoe Thingyan and Sann Aung say those crowded out of the visa and passport process will probably leave anyway, however they can.
Thura*, 33, is one of those making plans to escape should he need to flee.
A human rights worker, Thura said he hopes he can avoid the draft as the sole caregiver to elderly parents, one of a handful of exemptions in the conscription law.
“But if the military still tries to force me to serve, I will try to move to Thailand,” he said, “legally or illegally”.
Thura says the current rate for a covert trip from Mandalay to the Thailand border is 2.5 million kyats (about $1,200), including border smuggler’s fees.
Wary of a new wave of people fleeing from Myanmar, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has warned that anyone caught crossing the border illegally will face “legal action”.
Undeterred by the potential repercussions, Thura is resolved not to fight for a military widely accused of waging an indiscriminate war that has killed thousands of civilians, displaced millions and tipped Myanmar into chaos.
His reasons are personal as well as political. Thura tells how friends who joined armed groups fighting the military have been killed in battle, and that another who was arrested for simply protesting against the military coup has been sentenced to death.
“If I’m forced to serve in the military, I will try to move to another place or another country,” he said.
“But if I fail and I’m caught and forced to serve, I will try to escape and run away. I cannot shoot at my friends.”
*Some names have been changed to shield the identities of individuals worried about their safety.
Kedah, Malaysia – Until six months ago, none of the inhabitants of the village of Bukit Choras, set amid rice fields near the steep and lush hill of the same name in northwestern Malaysia, had any idea they had been living next to an archaeological wonder all their lives.
It was only after a team of 11 researchers cleared the thick bushes and secondary jungle from the top of the hill, and gently scraped away at the soil that a missing piece of Southeast Asian history was revealed.
The 1,200-year-old Buddhist stupa of Bukit Choras was discovered last August in Malaysia’s Bujang Valley – a river basin scattered with several clusters of protohistoric sites in the country’s northwestern Kedah state.
The stupa is the best preserved in the country and experts say it could hold the key to Malaysia’s long history of multiculturalism.
“This site is an anomaly because it stands all by itself,” Nasha Rodziadi Khaw told Al Jazeera. Nasha is the chief researcher of the team from the University of Science Malaysia’s Global Archaeology Research Centre (CGAR) in the northwestern island of Penang, who supervised the excavation between August 28 and September 12 last year.
Bukit Choras is situated near the small town of Yan on Kedah’s southern coast about 370km north of the capital, Kuala Lumpur.
Nasha Rodziadi Khaw led the team of scientists who unearthed Bukit Choras’s stupa [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]
Unlike the 184 archaeological sites previously identified in the Bujang Valley, which lie to the south, the stupa is isolated on the northern side of Mount Jerai, which was once a cape and a pivotal navigation point for seafaring traders who ventured to this part of the world from as far as the Arabian peninsula.
“We are still not sure of Bukit Choras’s function. It may have been a military garrison or coastal trade outpost, but we need to do further excavation [to assess]. Based on our preliminary findings, it shows plenty of similarities with other sites found in Java and Sumatra, Indonesia,” said Nasha, whose team will continue to work at the site throughout the first half of 2024.
A forlorn discovery
According to Nasha, Bukit Choras was first reported in 1850 by a British officer looking for treasures, and then, in 1937, briefly studied by another British scholar, HG Quaritch Wales. Wales undertook some minor excavations, but only reported finding a squarish Buddhist stupa, taking note of its measurements. He never provided any illustration or plate for the site.
Nearly 50 years later, in 1984, the then-director of the Bujang Valley Archaeological Museum returned to Bukit Choras to do some site cleaning and documentation, but the site remained largely undisturbed.
“I realised that nobody had done proper investigation [since then] and managed to get a fund to survey the site in 2017,” Nasha told Al Jazeera.
“We used electronic waves to do physical detection of what was hidden underground and found there were some big structures underneath.”
Nasha received more funding from Malaysia’s Ministry of Higher Education to conduct proper excavations in 2022, and his team was stunned to discover how well-preserved the site was compared with those unearthed in the Bujang Valley between the 1930s and 1950s – some of which had deteriorated because of erosion, human activities and even accidental destruction.
“At first we only excavated 40 percent of the whole Bukit Choras site, finding a stupa about nine metres long,” said Nasha. “But the most important discovery was two stucco statues of Buddha in good condition that have never been found in the area before.”
Stucco, Nasha explained, was thought to only be found in Java and Sumatra in neighbouring Indonesia, as well as in India, at the time.
Ancient ties
Placed in two niches together with an inscription in Pallava (the language of the Pallava Dynasty that ruled in South India between the 3rd and 8th century CE), Bukit Choras’s two Buddha statues have architectural features resembling those of other ancient artefacts from the Srivijaya kingdom that prospered between the 7th and 11th centuries CE, in an area from southern Thailand, through the Malay peninsula and into Java. The statues are now being studied and restored at CGAR on Penang island.
“The discovery of two still intact, human size statues and the inscription is very significant for further studies,” Mohd Azmi, the commissioner of Malaysia’s National Heritage Department, told Al Jazeera. “This shows that the site has not been disturbed and has the potential to give new evidence on Ancient Kedah’s history.”
Excavation trenches at the Sungai Batu Archaeological Complex [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]
The discoveries in the Bujang Valley testify to an ancient civilisation that archaeologists refer to as the “Ancient Kedah Kingdom”. It prospered between the 2nd and the 14th century CE, stretching across the northwestern coast of the Malay peninsula and into Thailand predating the arrival of Islam in the region.
Ancient Kedah grew rich on international trade as well as the production of iron and glass beads, prospering as a multiethnic and multireligious ancient Southeast Asian polity where residents and foreign traders lived together.
Nasha points out that findings in the area suggest that for centuries, traders from China, India and even the Middle East came to the area to do business – and were often forced to spend long spells in Kedah when the harsh monsoon seasons made sailing back home impossible.
Temples and artefacts were built by local labourers mixing foreign architectural motifs and knowledge with two main influences.
“First is Buddhism, classified in areas such as Sungai Mas, Kuala Muda, and Sungai Batu in Semeling, plus the most recent being the temple site at Bukit Choras,” explained Asyaari Muhamad, a senior archaeologist and the director of the Institute of the Malay World & Civilisation at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, referring to some of the Bujang Valley sites.
“The rest, such as the archaeological site in the Pengkalan Bujang complex [near the village of] Merbok, received Hindu influences. This classification is [based on] the discovery of artefacts and temple structures symbolising the religious beliefs or influences at that time,” he said.
All of Ancient Kedah’s temples functioned as places of worship mostly for the mixed population of migrant traders and workers.
“In [the area of] Sungai Bujang, for example, most of the temples are clustered together near the main trading area and used to cater for the religious needs of the traders, while in Sungai Muda, they catered to the traders and workers of the local glass bead and pottery-making sites,” said Nasha.
Tuyeres, or air conduits, for the ancient iron smelting sites whose remains were found at Sungai Batu Archaeological Complex [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]
“We believe it was the same in Sungai Batu, the main site for Ancient Kedah’s iron smelting furnaces, where we found evidence of a community and its temples. But in Bukit Choras, proof of economic activities or industry has not yet been found,” he said.
Archaeological discoveries suggest that while Ancient Kedah thrived for centuries, it went into decline when climate transformed the large maritime bay and accessible riverways leading to the iron smelting site of Sungai Batu into mangrove and tidal swamps that were impassable to ships.
“Multiculturalism is not new in the Malay peninsula and Ancient Kedah,” added Nasha. “It started with trade in the 2nd century, when there was an increase of connectivity between China, India and Southeast Asia, and continued well into the Melaka kingdom, which we know was also a multicultural society, and continues today.”
The Malaysia of the 21st century is also a multiethnic and multireligious Southeast Asian nation made up of a majority of Malay Muslims, followed by Chinese, Indians and more than 50 other ethnic groups living across the peninsula and the northern half of the island of Borneo in the states of Sarawak and Sabah.
Asyaari said it was important for researchers to collaborate and reach a better understanding of the origins of civilisations in and beyond the Malay peninsula.
“Any statements about new or previous findings need to be carefully examined so that […] a theory, discovery, and the results of a study do not become an issue and controversial in nature,” he said.
Disaster management agency says more than 80,000 people have fled to temporary government shelters.
Flash floods and a landslide on Indonesia’s Sumatra island have left at least 19 people dead and seven others missing, officials have said.
Mud, rocks and uprooted trees rushed down a mountainside and engulfed villages in the Pesisir Selatan district of West Sumatra province late on Friday following torrential rains, Doni Yusrizal, who heads the local disaster management agency, said on Sunday.
Yusrizal said rescuers recovered seven bodies in the village of Koto XI Tarusan and three others in two neighbouring villages.
“Relief efforts for the dead and missing were hampered by power outages, blocked roads covered in thick mud and debris,” Yusrizal said.
Indonesia’s National Disaster Management Agency said six bodies were found in Pesisir Selatan and three bodies were found in the neighbouring district of Padang Pariaman, bringing the death toll so far to 19.
The agency said at least two villagers were injured and seven others were still missing, with more than 80,000 people fleeing to temporary government shelters.
Flash floods and landslides are a common occurrence in Indonesia, where millions of people live near floodplains, especially during the rainy season.
In December, at least two people were killed when a landslide and floods swept away dozens of houses and destroyed a hotel near Lake Toba on Sumatra.
We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously.
Cookie
Duration
Description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional
11 months
The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
viewed_cookie_policy
11 months
The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.
Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
