Protests by Chinese construction workers, teachers, and factory employees demanding unpaid wages have erupted across China in recent days amid rising public anger over the impacts of tightening local government finances, according to affected workers and videos posted on social media. From China’s northern province of Hebei to the southern autonomous region of Guanxi, bordering Vietnam, and its neighboring coastal province of Guangdong to the east – Chinese workers are facing the full impact of cash-strapped institutions grasping for ways to survive the economic downturn. In an example of measures…
Category: RFA
Hong Kong journalists face tax audits in latest pressure on independent media
Hong Kong authorities have targeted independent news outlets and journalists with error-filled tax audits casting a shadow over press freedom in the city state, a journalists’ association said Wednesday. The Hong Kong Journalists Association said that at least eight independent media outlets and about 20 journalists and their family members have been subjected to tax audits by the Inland Revenue Department for tax claims dating back seven years. The association expressed concern that this could further reduce the operating space for small-scale and independent news outlets in a city once…
South Africa downgrades Taiwan status, signaling more China influence, say experts
In a sign of China’s expanding international influence, South Africa has downgraded the status of Taiwan’s liaison office in the country, further diminishing the democratic island’s diplomatic footprint, experts say. South Africa severed formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan in 1997 and recognized Beijing as the government of China. But in the nearly three decades since, it has retained unofficial ties with Taipei and a trading relationship. However, it’s recently moved to diminish Taiwan’s unofficial status in the country. South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation now categorizes the Taiwan…
Cambodian journalist who exposed illegal logging slapped with incitement charge
An environmental journalist who had reported on logging in a wildlife sanctuary has been charged with incitement and defamation, in the latest sign of deteriorating press freedom in Cambodia, a human rights group said Tuesday. The journalist, Ouk Mao, 49, was arrested at his home in the northeastern province of Stung Treng last Friday by plainclothes officers who did not produce a warrant. Ouk Mao’s wife Ek Socheat told environmental news outlet Mongabay that three plainclothes officers entered his home, handcuffed him and told him that “their boss wanted to…
215 Vietnamese stuck in squalid border camp after leaving Myanmar scam center
Read reporting on this topic in Vietnamese here. Many weeks after they were rescued from scam centers inside Myanmar, more than 200 Vietnamese workers are still stranded in a squalid camp near the Thai border because they can’t afford their passage home, two of the workers told Radio Free Asia. “Life here is very hard. The accommodation is like a chicken coop. You have to sleep on the floor on mats,” said a 31-year-old woman from the northern Vietnamese province of Son La, adding that conditions were “miserable” and infections…
Activists, devotees gather to honor Tibetan Buddhist leader who died in Vietnam
DHARAMSALA, India — Hundreds of Tibetans gathered on Friday at the Main Temple in Dharamsala, India to offer prayers to mark 49 days since the death of Tulku Hungkar Dorje – the revered Tibetan religious leader and educator who died in custody in Vietnam in March 2025. His followers say the Buddhist leader, who had been missing for over eight months, had fled to Vietnam to escape Chinese government persecution for his work as an educator and promoter of Tibetan language and culture. tibet-buddhist-leader-china-vietnam A portrait Tulku Hungkar Dorje at…
30 years on, rights groups press China for word of Tibet’s missing Panchen Lama
The Tibetan government-in-exile and rights groups have called on China to free the Panchen Lama, the second-highest spiritual leader in the largest sect of Tibetan Buddhism, who was kidnapped 30 years ago and has remained missing ever since. “At just six years old, he was abducted by Chinese authorities — an act that remains one of the starkest examples of China’s grave human rights violations,” Tenzin Lekshay, spokesperson for the Dharamsala, India-based Tibetan exile government, known as the Central Tibetan Administration, told Radio Free Asia. “We urgently call on the…
Rights group raises alarm over ethnic Kazakh who fled Xinjiang
A human rights group is urging Kazakhstan not to deport to China a 23-year-old ethnic Kazakh man who fled from Xinjiang several weeks ago, warning he could face persecution and internment there. Atajurt, a volunteer group that campaigns for Kazakh victims of oppression in Xinjiang, said Friday it had confirmed that the man, Yerzhanat Abai, has been detained by Kazakh police. Serikzhan Bilash, who heads the group, said Yerzhanat Abai, a Chinese national, is being held in the Panfilov City Detention Center in Zharkent county, Almaty province, which is about…
Thailand, Vietnam raise relations to the highest level
BANGKOK – Thailand and Vietnam have agreed to raise political and economic relations to the highest level, a comprehensive strategic partnership, the two countries’ prime ministers announced on Friday. Vietnam’s Pham Minh Chinh and Thailand’s Paetongtarn Shinawatra’s announcement came in a news conference following their meeting in Hanoi. “This is not only a political statement, representing a symbolic milestone, but also a strategic commitment, affirming a new breakthrough in the content and depth of cooperation,” Vietnam’s Chinh said. The two leaders also pledged to lift bilateral trade to US$25 billion…
Thai building collapse exposes flaws in its migrant-heavy construction sector
BANGKOK – A month after a deadly earthquake triggered the collapse of a high-rise construction site in Bangkok, labor rights groups say the disaster has exposed long-standing flaws in Thailand’s construction sector – particularly its failure to protect the migrant workers who keep it running. On the day of the quake, more than 100 workers were inside a 32-story unfinished tower when tremors from a 7.7-magnitude earthquake in neighboring Myanmar shook the Thai capital, causing the building to crumble. Many of those trapped were migrant workers from Myanmar, drawn to…