PHNOM PENH POST (also in ELEVEN)
May 31 “Gov’t allows VoA to open a representative bureau”
… The US embassy spokesman in Phnom Penh, Arend Zwartjes, confirmed that the officials had agreed on a roadmap for registering VoA and Radio Free Asia (RFA) in Cambodia.
BITTER WINTER
May 31 “Books on Religion Branded Harmful, Handles as Pornography”
… The document mentions explicitly Facebook and Twitter, as well as Radio Free Asia, The Epoch Times, and other overseas media, and demands to employ strict measures against people using various firewall-circumvention software to get information through these websites and the “reverse flowing of harmful information,” i.e., information unfavorable to the government that is accessible to domestic population.
DALLAS MORNING NEWS (also in MODESTO BEE and CORVALLIS GAZETTE-TIMES)
… This week, Radio Free Asia reported that Chin villagers were being forced to transport food rations for troops battling rebel armies, with the military demanding one laborer per family.
CHOSUN ILBO
May 24 “N. Korea ‘Would Only Give Nuclear Details to Trump”
… Meanwhile, the Seoul bureau chief of Japan's Asahi Shimbun daily told Radio Free Asia the same day that U.S. and South Korean intelligence officials estimate there are "at least 300 nuclear-related facilities" in North Korea.
FRONTIER MYANMAR
May 21 “‘They want to grow their armies’: Shan armed groups obstruct family planning efforts”
… In July last year, Radio Free Asia reported that the RCSS had forcibly recruited more than 50 young men from villages in Mongpan Township.
NPR
May 20 “With New Style And Graphics, North Korea Gives Propaganda A Makeover”
… Increasingly, ordinary North Koreans are also exposed to outside news and entertainment through smuggled DVDs, thumb drives and memory cards or in broadcasts from foreign media outlets, such as Radio Free Asia and the BBC, accessed through shortwave radios.
MANILA BULLETIN
May 19 ”US ambassador to China to make first visit to Tibet since 2013: report”
… Branstad was scheduled to visit the Tibet Autonomous Region and Qinghai Province, a historic region of Tibet known to Tibetans as Amdo, from Sunday to Saturday, Radio Free Asia said in a report.
TRICYCLE
May 18 “Nepal Orders Investigation of Journalists who published Dalai Lama Report”
… “Unfortunately, we are now being criticized for acting against our country’s foreign policy and the One-China policy by disseminating this information,” Lamichhanne told Radio Free Asia’s Tibetan Service.
WASHINGTON POST
… Also speaking at Thursday’s hearing was Gulchehra Hoja, an ethnic Uighur journalist with Radio Free Asia in Washington. Hoja has said that more than 20 of her relatives — including her brother and her elderly parents — have been detained in China because of her reporting on human rights abuses in the Muslim-majority Xinjiang region.
FORBES
May 11 “Beijing's South China Sea Bet On Duterte's 'Friendship' Is Souring”
… That’s according to Radio Free Asia report (RFA), which quoted presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo saying that the government was “duty bound” to enforce the court order.
MOROCCO WORLD NEWS
May 10 “Ramadan in Xinjiang Province a Sign of Extremism Says China”
… Last year, Radio Free Asia reported that during Ramadan, the authorities forced restaurants to stay open and restricted access to mosques, Amnesty added.
ASIA TIMES (also in WASHINGTON TIMES)
May 8 “Mystery surrounds kidnapped Panchen Lama”
… Similarly, the US government’s Radio Free Asia (RFA) published on its website a different portrait by its “cartoonist” of what the boy might look like on his 30th birthday.
DONG-A ILBO
May 8 “‘A ballistic missile with a range of 450 km,' say U.S. experts”
… David Schmuller, a senior fellow at James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, and Joshua Pollack, a senior research associate at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, also said at the Radio Free Asia that this was clearly a missile taking into consideration various factors the presence of a guidance device, the shape of the launch pad, etc.
ASIA TIMES (also in COCONUTS, IRRAWADDY)
May 7 “Reuters’ daring duo walk free in Myanmar”
… It also recently sued The Irrawaddy, an online publication, and the US Congress-funded Radio Free Asia, for defamation over their coverage of clashes between AA and the Myanmar military where civilians were reportedly killed.
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH (also in UNB)
May 6 “Myanmar: Deaths in Army Custody Need Independent Inquiry”
… “The aid groups have not been allowed to visit the scene for now to prevent unwanted confusion,” Brig. Gen. Zaw Min Tun told Radio Free Asia on the day of the shootings. “When they finish the announcements and interrogations, they will allow the aid groups to come in.”
SEATTLE TIMES
May 6 “Cambodians who fled to Seattle ‘shocked’ as details emerge of state senator’s $500K deal with regime”
… “I think it is a good idea to ask help from foreigners to defend Cambodia and its people’s interests,” Sok Ey San, a spokesman for the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, told Radio Free Asia last month.
IRRAWADDY
May 6 “Special Branch Sues Editor of Sittwe-Based Publication DMG”
… The military recently sued The Irrawaddy online publication and Radio Free Asia (RFA) for defamation over their coverage of the armed clashes between Myanmar military troops and the AA group in northern Rakhine.
May 3 “9-year-old girl who fled North Korea faces repatriation after arrest in China”
…. In 2017, five North Korean defectors killed themselves with poison after being arrested by Chinese police, fearing a worse punishment if they were sent back, according to Radio Free Asia.
SOUTHEAST ASIAN PRESS ALLIANCE (also in PHNOM PENH POST, ASEAN TODAY)
May 3 “Suppression via Legislation”
… Two former Radio Free Asia (RFA) journalists, Yeang Sothearin and Uon Chhin, who were detained in November 2017 on charges of providing a “foreign state with information which undermines national defense” (Article 445 of the Criminal Code).
DIPLOMAT
May 3 “Southeast Asia, the Frontline for a Free Press”
… Perhaps the most shocking case of recent months is that of Truong Duy Nhat, a Vietnamese journalist and weekly Radio Free Asia contributor.
NK NEWS
May 3 “South Korea “mobilizing all” diplomatic resources to help defectors held in China”
… “I spoke to my daughter just a day before the arrest and promised to meet her soon,” the girl’s mother reportedly told a Radio Free Asia (RFA) reporter at the rally.
KHMER TIMES
May 3 “Ministry calls on journalists to uphold ethics and professionalism”
… “I think the press situation in Cambodia at this present has become better after […] the closure of the Cambodia Daily and Radio Free Asia offices, and the dissolution of the CNRP,” he said.
HILL
May 2 “Making a commitment to media freedom”
… VOA and its sister organizations such as Radio Free Asia and RFE/RL serve an estimated weekly audience of 345 million people in 58 languages in countries where the media face these pressures every day.
SPECTATOR
May 1 “China’s war on Islam”
… According to the independent non-profit Radio Free Asia, Chinese authorities demolished more than 5,000 mosques in 2016-17 alone.
FORBES (also in WIRED)
May 1 “Reuters Reporters Wa Lone And Kyaw Soe Oo And Columnist Jamal Khashoggi Among Journalists On Latest "10 Most Urgent" List Of Press Freedom Cases From One Free Press Coalition”
… The sixteen new members include: AméricaEconomía, Bloomberg News, BuzzFeed, Estadão, India Today, Insider Inc., Middle East Broadcasting Networks, Office of Cuba Broadcasting, Quartz, Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, The Straits Times, TV Azteca, The Washington Post, Voice of America and WIRED.
ASIA TIMES
May 1 “China throws Hun Sen an economic lifeline”
… Rong Chhun, president of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions, said in an interview with Radio Free Asia that all this was China simply “consoling” Hun Sen.
