Mass arrests reported in Indonesia's restive Papua

Nearly 2,000 pro-independence demonstrators were arrested by police in Indonesia's eastern province of Papua over the past week before most of them were released.

The mass arrests coincided with the run-up to the anniversary of the territory's integration into Indonesia.

Veronica Koman, a lawyer based in the Indonesian capital Jakarta, told Al Jazeera dozens of people were arrested on Tuesday, with at least 19 children detained in the town of Fakfak, about 1,500km from Jayapura, the provincial capital of Papua province.

"Six have been admitted to hospital today," she said citing sources on the ground.

In the largest mass arrests known so far, 1,449 people were arrested on Monday in Jayapura, 200 in Merauke, 45 in Semarane, 42 in Makaffar, and dozens more across the resource rich region, she added.

Exactly 1,449 people were arrested in Jayapura on Monday [Veronica Koman/Al Jazeera]

Victor Yeimo, the chairman of the West Papua National Committee (KNPB), which organised the protest, told Al Jazeera that most of the nearly 2,000 people arrested had been released but hundreds were still in detention.

Foreign journalists have been banned from reporting in Papua and local journalists barred from covering the protests.

Police told Al Jazeera that there were no reports of violence and that the protesters did not have a permit to hold the rally.

"At least two people were arrested while handing a petition to the police," Koman said.

"It's unclear what legal justification the Indonesian authorities could have for the arrests, we're currently investigating what the reasons could be."

Violent separatist conflict

Papua has seen a long-running and often violent separatist conflict since being incorporated into Indonesia after a widely criticised United Nations-backed referendum in 1969. Dutch colonial rule ended on May 1, 1963.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo has made several trips to Papua since taking office in 2014 and has promised to bring development to the impoverished region after decades of neglect.

His government has also released several political prisoners and pledged to resolve cases of human rights violations.

But security forces still maintain a strong presence in the restive region and are often seen as taking a heavy-handed approach to peaceful demonstrations, activists say.

Papua province and West Papua make up the western half of an island north of Australia, with independent Papua New Guinea to the east.

Source: Al Jazeera

After the massacre: Indonesia's first step in healing

Official symposium held for the 500,000 people killed during 1960s communist purge, but truth still elusive for victims.

Jakarta, Indonesia - Sumini travelled from her village in Central Java to the capital to ask just one question: "What did I do wrong?"

Indonesian men and women in their late 60s and 70s, clearly tainted by a life of struggle, bravely grabbed their first opportunity to speak out in more than 50 years. Voices breaking with emotion, they spoke clearly and undeniably about mass killings, torture, and unlawful detentions that started in 1965.

Sumini, then 18 years old, had joined a women's organisation linked to the Communist Party because she wanted to empower female farmers. Though she survived, she spent years in prison without any trial and faced discrimination formthe rest of her life.

The Indonesian government's decision to open this dark chapter has been lauded by human rights advocates, but it was a long time coming. It took years of pressure from activists and the film by Joshua Oppenheimer who gave the world a gruelling inside look with the Act of Killing, but most of all the courage of thousands of survivors who never stopped fighting for justice.

Their testimonies at a government-sponsored symposium in Jakarta were fragments of a long-hidden truth. They reveal a military that was ordered to go on a murder spree in villages around the country after General Suharto took power. The Communist Party, then the second largest in the world, got the blame for a failed coup and the murder of six generals.

A process of justice was not enough, Suharto and his troops aided by paramilitary groups, Islamic organisations, and the CIA decided to wipe out anyone remotely linked to the Communists.

Researchers estimate that at least half a million people died. As a result, Indonesia lost a whole generation of intellectuals, farmers, and social activists.

After decades of anti-communist propaganda, the killers still to this day believe they did the right thing. The massacre of 1965 is one of the worst in the 20th century and still divides Indonesians.

The government of President Joko Widodo was the first to break the silence - despite pressure from the military and conservative groups that still insist that talking to victims means giving room to communism. Just last week a discussion organised by survivors before the government symposium was forcefully broken up after threats by a radical group.

But from the start of the Jakarta symposium it was clear that the government was still not prepared to reveal the full truth. A high-ranking general active in 1965 and the government's security minister immediately denied any mass killings took place. Minister Luhut Pandjaitan estimated that fewer than 1,000 people died - a shocking statement for survivors to hear.

They had travelled from all over the country hoping to be able to hear and tell the truth. But instead of walking out angrily, most just shook their heads and continued their mission of truth-telling.

The response showed how immune victims have become after decades of official lies, and how firmly they wanted to use this unique - and maybe only - opportunity to tell their side of the story.Their hopes for justice and a formal government apology are slim. But now the government has opened a Pandora's box.

President Joko will have to come up with a solution acceptable to all those millions of Indonesians whose rights have been denied for more than half a century.

A truth and reconciliation commission, South Africa-style, has been mentioned. But so far the government seems only interested in reconciliation - not so much in the truth.
Source

Myanmar sets timeline for power transition

he names of Myanmar's next president and two vice presidents will be revealed on March 17, an official said Monday

February 8, 2016 2:12AM ET

The names of Myanmar's next president and two vice presidents will be revealed on March 17, an official said Monday, setting a clear timeline for the transition of power from a military-controlled government to democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi's party.

Parliament chairman Mann Win Khaing Than announced that the upper house, the lower House and the military will have to select one candidate each for the three posts before March 17, and submit them to parliament on that day.

While Suu Kyi herself is barred from becoming president, there are growing signs that her talks with the military to remove a constitutional hurdle blocking her path can be completed by March 17.

Once the three names are put before the 664-member parliament, all members will take a vote. The person with the largest number of votes will become president, and the other two will be vice presidents. It isn't clear when the vote will take place, but the current president's term ends March 31 and the successor must take office April 1.

Given that Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party has a majority in both houses of parliament, it is certain to get the president's post and one of the vice presidential positions.

The NLD won a landslide victory in the Nov. 8 general elections. But Suu Kyi has been stymied by the Constitution's Article 59 (f), which says anyone with a foreign spouse or children cannot hold the executive office. Suu Kyi's late husband was British as are her two sons.

Still, she has been negotiating with commander-in-chief Gen. Min Aung Hlaing on having the clause suspended. The clause can be legally scrapped only through a 75 percent plus one vote in Parliament. The military holds 25 percent of seats in parliament — all unelected — which means the NLD cannot scrap the clause on its own. However, the clause can be suspended by a simple majority, but because all this is uncharted territory nobody is sure if that would be allowed.

The military has been in power since 1962, either directly or through a proxy government. It called an election in 1990, which Suu Kyi's party won only to see the results annulled by the military.

Myanmar started moving from a half-century of dictatorship toward democracy in 2011, when military rulers inexplicably agreed to hand over power to a nominally civilian government headed by President Thein Sein, a general turned reformist. He will stand down in late March or early April when an NLD president will take over.

Suu Kyi has said previously that even if she doesn't become the president she would run the country from behind the scenes.

Suu Kyi became increasingly defiant on the presidential clause as the scale of her victory became apparent, making it clear she will run the country regardless of who the NLD elects as president.

"He will have no authority. He will act in accordance with the decisions of the party," said Suu Kyiin an interview with Channel News Asia in November, adding that the president would be "told exactly what he can do."

But clearly, the NLD would prefer that the 70-year-old Nobel peace laureate lead the country, having struggled almost all her adult life for it.

In separate but identical broadcasts late Sunday, Sky Net and Myanmar National Television, both pro-government, said "positive results could come out on the negotiation for the suspension of the constitution Article 59 (f)."

"I think everything will be fine," said Kyaw Htwe, a senior member of the NLD who is also a member of parliament. “

The negotiations will be positive for our leader Aung San Suu Kyi to become president."

But Yan Myo Thein, a political analyst, advised caution.

"It is still too early to confirm that Suu Kyi will be among the presidential candidate," he said. "Even the suspension and the constitutional amendment will take time. And we cannot really comment relying only on a short announcement on TV.”

Australia to deport terminally ill asylum seekers

The country’s High Court has ruled it legal to deport ill refugees, including 37 babies, to detention centers

February 8, 2016 10:43AM ET

Some of the 267 asylum seekers Australia wants to deport to an offshore immigration center after a court ruling are suffering from cancer and other terminal illnesses, a senior government official said on Monday.

Australia's High Court last week upheld the government's decision to deport detained asylum seekers to the tiny South Pacific island of Nauru, about 1,800 miles northeast of Australia.

The decision provoked criticism from the United Nations and sparked protest, with church leaders offering asylum seekers sanctuary.

The center has been widely criticized for harsh conditions and reports of systemic child abuse and sexual assault.

Some deportations could begin within days, but others would have to be dealt with in a staged fashion because of the illnesses, said Michael Pezzullo, the secretary of the Department of Immigration and Border Protection.

"In some cases, we're talking about cancer. We're talking about all sorts of long-run illnesses," he told a parliamentary hearing. "Regrettably in some cases, for reasons to do with very long-term and, indeed, potentially terminal illnesses, some folks, I suspect, will be here for quite a while."

The refugees, including 37 infants, were taken to Australia from Nauru for medical treatment.

Under Australia's controversial immigration policy, asylum seekers trying to reach the country by boat are intercepted and sent to camps on Nauru or on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea. They are not allowed to be resettled in Australia.

Both the ruling conservative Liberal Party of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and the center-left Labor Party support the policy, which was introduced by Labor's then–Prime Minister Kevin Ruddy.

The policy's supporters argue that the policy of deterrence is necessary to stop asylum seekers from dying at sea while attempting to make the sea crossing, often on rickety boats used by people smugglers.

Although the numbers trying to reach Australia are small in comparison with the flood of asylum seekers in Europe, the issue is a perennial hot-button political issue at home and abroad.

China shares nosedive triggering new trading halt

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/01/chinese-markets-suspended-time-week-160107031427586.html

Chinese stock markets tumbled by more than seven percent, forcing exchanges to suspend trading for the second time in a week.
The official Xinhua news agency said on Thursday that trading on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges was frozen for the day.
The drop is being linked to poor economic figures, tensions after North Korea's nuclear test and the spat between the Arab world and Iran.
Reporting from Beijing, Al Jazeera's Adrian Brown, said that just 15 minutes of trading were possible on Thursday.
"There is evidence to show that China's currency, the yuan, is continuing to weaken which provides further confirmation that,the world's second largest economy is continuing to slow even more," Brown said.

"Also, there were reports on Thursday that the head of one of the country's big security exchanges was under investigation for corruption and insider trading," he added.
"And then, of course, on Wednesday North Korea claimed that it had successfully detonated a hydrogen bomb and that didn't exactly improve market sentiment".

Lifting restrictions

Song Seng Wun, a regional economist for CIMB Private Banking in Singapore, told Al Jazeera the catalyst for the nosedive in the share-price came from concerns over the state of the Chinese economy.
"Then, of course, with the lockdown on shares supposedly expiring this Friday, there is a general worry that there could be this stampede through the door.

"If the macro-fundamentals haven’t really improved, there will be more selling ... this has set the stage for the current sell-down," he said.

The restriction on selling shares came into force during the market turmoil in August and the fear is that if a lot of cheap stock enters the market on Friday, the prices of shares would continue to tumble.
The so-called "circuit breakers", which took effect on January 1 intended to curb volatility, also kicked in on Monday to halt stock trading.

Regulators announced in December that they would introduce the emergency measures, which are aimed at preventing huge price swings.

Beijing has been trying to restore investor confidence after markets plunged in June following huge gains in the preceding year. The market meltdown has prompted a panicked, multibillion-dollar government intervention.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index tumbled 7.3 percent to 3,115.89 before trading was halted.
The smaller Shenzhen Composite Index slumped 8.3 percent to 1,955.88.
The negative sentiment on the Chinese mainland spread to other major Asian markets.
Japanese shares were dragged down by a stronger yen and the heavy losses in China.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 Stock Average lost 423.98 points, or 2.33 per cent, to end at 17,767.34, hitting the lowest in three months. The broader Topix index was down 30.9 points, or 2.08 per
cent, at 1,457.94.
The main indexes of the Hong Kong stock exchange were down over 2.5 per cent.

Sri Lanka to launch special court to probe war crimes

Sri Lanka will launch a special war crimes court early next year to investigate major atrocities during the bloody finale to its decades-long ethnic war, a top official said Tuesday.
Former president Chandrika Kumaratunga, who heads the office of national unity and reconciliation, said her work cannot be done without justice for victims of the 37-year conflict that ended in May 2009.
“We have ended the war nearly seven years ago, but we have not won the peace,” Kumaratunga told reporters. “No reconciliation is possible without accepting the mistakes of the past.”
She said tens of thousands of victims of the Tamil separatist conflict would not accept reconciliation unless war criminals are brought to justice.
A special court is set to begin work by January, two months before a UN Human Rights Council review of Sri Lanka's progress in implementing a September resolution calling for accountability for war crimes, she said.
“Enormous amount of work has been done and the special court should start its work by the end of this month or by early January,” she said.
“They (the court) will not be chasing behind every soldier, but the main line of command will be looked at,” she said, adding that surviving Tamil rebel leaders would also be hauled up to answer allegations of “horrendous crimes” by the rebels.
International rights groups as well as Tamils had pressed for international judges and prosecutors to be involved in a Sri Lankan war crimes probe, but the government has firmly rejected this.
Kumaratunga said she personally believed that involving independent foreign judges was preferable, as suggested in a UN Human Rights Council resolution adopted in October. Local and international rights groups have accused both sides in the war of targeting civilians. At least 100,000 civilians were killed in the conflict between 1972 and 2009.
Some of the bloodiest fighting came in the last two months when troops unleashed a no-holds-barred onslaught against the rebels, with rights group saying tens of thousands of people may have been killed.
Kumaratunga, who ruled between 1994 and 2005, said her office was working on building bridges between the majority Sinhalese and minority Tamils to ensure ethnic peace after decades of war.
“Reconciliation and accountability will have to go hand in hand,” Kumaratunga said. “You cannot have one without the other.”

Japan combats rise in hate speech

On a chilly February evening in 2013, Shinhae Lee, a journalist and ethnic Korean woman who has lived in Japan her whole life, was at home by herself in Osaka when her computer pinged with a message from a friend. It said the leader of the nationalist group Zaitokukai had just announced on the Internet that he was sending her a spike, known in Japanese lore for its ability to curse someone to death.

Sensing she was up against thousands of faceless ultranationalists who wished her the worst, Lee went to the police, who said there was nothing they could do. She had been told the same thing two years earlier, when she reported that she felt threatened by a wave of hateful comments online and in public. A 44-year-old freelance writer who lives with her Japanese husband and teenage son, Lee got on Zaitokukai’s radar in 2011 after criticizing the group, which claims to have about 15,000 members, in a series of articles and TV appearances. Zaitokukai followers retaliated against Lee at rallies and on social media, calling her a “Korean hag” and other ethnically and sexually charged invectives. Once, after a Tokyo protest, a 28-year-old office worker wrote on Twitter, “Let’s expel Koreans, the good ones and bad ones, and let’s kill that woman,” referring to Lee. The police questioned him, and he apologized, but she was deeply shaken by how casually and gleefully strangers could champion her murder.

There are half a million ethnic Koreans in Japan, people known as Zainichi. They have kept their South Korean citizenship out of ancestral pride, but Zainichi are permanent residents. They're assimilated into Japanese culture, and many don’t speak Korean or have ties to Korea. Even so, ultranationalist groups like Zaitokukai have singled them out and used Japan’s very liberal protection of speech to harass, intimidate and silence Zainichi with noisy street protests and attacks online, often anonymously.

As a Zaitokukai spokesman said in a recent email, the ultimate goal of the group is to repeal the Immigration Control Act, which grants Zainichi permanent residency status and entitlement to health care, welfare and social security.

Japan is the only developed country without anti-discrimination laws. Although the government has long maintained that racism and discrimination don’t exist in Japan, the reality has gotten harder to deny. The rise of Zaitokukai has led to the spread of anti-Korean rallies across Japan, which draw dozens to hundreds of supporters from a radical fringe. They have marched with imperialist Japanese flags, described Koreans as parasites and criminals and called for their death. At one of its gatherings two years ago in Osaka, a 14-year-old Japanese girl told a small group of demonstrators, “I hate the Koreans so much, I can’t stand it. I just want to kill them all now.” She then proposed a massacre like the Rape of Nanking, prompting cheers of approval.

In the last few years, however, Zaitokukai has encountered a backlash. Japanese people have confronted members at their rallies with larger counterdemonstrations, a few of which turned violent. And in an unprecedented decision, the Japanese Supreme Court upheld a groundbreaking ruling forcing Zaitokukai to pay about $100,000 to a Kyoto elementary school for harassing ethnic Korean students after members stood outside the school shouting through bullhorns that children were cockroaches and children of spies. This summer, a Zainichi woman in Osaka filed suit against her company and its chairman for distributing discriminatory materials about Japanese-Koreans at work. And there is Lee’s case: After the online attacks, she filed suit in the Osaka District Court against the Zaitokukai and its then-leader, Makoto Sakurai, for $45,000.

“When I realized that criminal charges were difficult,” she said in a recent interview, “I felt that I had no choice but to take civil action.” In response, Sakurai, whose real surname is Takata, told the Japanese press, “She should take a good look herself at what she said. We plan to countersue her for groundless articles she wrote online.”

Lee is also suing the website Hoshu Sokuho for about $183,000 for compiling what she said are hateful anonymous messages about her and highlighting them on the Web message board 2channel. The case still has a long way to go, and the stress of it wears on her. She is often fearful in public and makes sure no one follows her from the courthouse. Though the harassment hasn’t let up, she and other Zainichi have noticed that anti-Korean rhetoric has become tempered lately. It’s now more common to call Koreans guests than to be explicitly racist and, in lieu of death threats, to complain about the special privileges they supposedly receive.

In a statement that anticipated Donald Trump’s infamous diatribe about Mexican immigrants, Sakurai expressed his concerns about the Zainichi at a 2013 rally near Tokyo. “Many Japanese are losing their lives because of crimes committed by Korean residents. Murder. Robbery. Arson. We are just saying that people who don’t like Japan should go back to their own country. What part of that is hate speech?” he said. More recently, a Zaitokukai spokesman claimed to be unaware of the extreme tactics often employed by the group, saying, “That Zainichi are discriminated against is a delusion.”

Another Zainichi woman to file a lawsuit, who is withholding her name to avoid harassment, disagrees with that assessment. A 47-year-old, third-generation Zainichi who lives with her Japanese husband and children in Osaka, she worked at Fuji Corp. without incident for a decade. But a few years ago, she said, her boss began sharing nationalistic propaganda and offensive comments about Zainichi, circulated in house on photocopied handouts. The material called them liars, expressed hatred and claimed they avoided paying taxes. “Some colleagues actually asked me if I ever pay taxes,” she said, deeply upset by all of it.

The woman went to Japan's Labor Standards Bureau and was told such statements were protected by free speech. So she got in touch with a lawyer and, before filing suit, wrote a letter asking the company to stop the offensive comments. In response, she was given the option to resign with compensation or to keep working without making a fuss. Instead, she initiated a lawsuit in August against the chairman and the company, suing them for about $275,000 for causing emotional distress.

After being reached for comment, Fuji Corp. posted a statement on its website calling her claim “groundless.”

According to Yasuko Morooka, a human rights lawyer and the author of the 2013 book “What Is Hate Speech?” these lawsuits will help anti-hate-speech legislation along by proving such discrimination does exist. “Almost all ethnic Koreans living in Japan have experienced discrimination,” she said in a recent interview, “so hate speech is nothing new.” With the recent increase in hate speech, a ban is necessary, she said, though it’s not a panacea.

“Education at school is essential to eradicating hate speech,” Morooka said, adding that erroneous beliefs about ethnic Koreans, like those promoted by Zaitokukai, arise from ignorance of Japan’s history with minorities. For much of the 20th century, anti-Korean sentiment was pervasive in Japan and affected government policy. “The Japanese government has been discriminating against ethnic Koreans living in Japan — the main target of hate speech — in its legal system since its colonial, expansionist era and postwar,” she said.

Yet there are signs that the government may be taking a more proactive approach. The national government launched an investigation into hate speech in July, and in May, Osaka became the first city in the country topropose a bill aimed at curbing hate speech. The same week, a group of national lawmakers submitted a bill that would outlaw racism and hate speech. Both proposals have stalled, yet in another sign of the momentum behind Japan’s anti-hate movement, more than 100 local governments across the country have formally condemned hate speech and made it harder to use public areas for hate rallies.

“We must stop hate speech now,” Morooka said, “so we don’t repeat history.”

UN: Myanmar releases 53 child soldiers

Myanmar's military released 53 children and young people from service on Monday as part of an effort to rid its ranks of underage soldiers, the United Nations said.

Human rights groups have long accused Myanmar's military, known as the Tatmadaw, of abuses such as using child soldiers, forcibly recruiting conscripts and confiscating land.

Since the military handed power to a semi-civilian government in 2011, it has taken some steps to professionalize the armed forces, including the release of soldiers recruited while under the age of 18.

“Today's release is the result of continued efforts of the government of Myanmar and the Tatmadaw to put an end to the harmful practice of recruiting and using children,” said Renata Lok-Dessallien, the U.N. Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Myanmar, in a statement.

“I am delighted to see these children and young people returning to their homes and families. We are hopeful that institutional checks that have been put in place and continued efforts will ensure that recruitment of children will exist no more.”

The military has released 146 underage recruits this year and 699 since it signed a joint action plan with the U.N. in 2012 to end the use of children in the military.

The U.N. said it had no estimate for the number of underage soldiers in Myanmar. Experts believe Myanmar's military to be between 300,000 and 350,000 strong, but the military does not release data on its size.

Lok-Dessallien also called on armed ethnic groups to stop recruiting child soldiers.

The U.N. Secretary-General has listed seven such groups as being “persistent perpetrators” in the recruitment and use of children in their operations.

They include the powerful Kachin Independence Army, which controls large swaths of Myanmar's northern Kachin State, and the United Wa State Army (UWSA). Operating on the Myanmar-China border, the UWSA is regarded as the largest and best equipped of Myanmar's armed ethnic groups.

The announcement of the release comes amid fighting between the military and ethnic groups in the eastern Shan State, as well as in Kachin.

Activists from Shan State last week accused the military of bombing schools and Buddhist temples, firing on civilians and raping women during its recent offensives.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that up to 6,000 people have been displaced by the fighting in Shan and another 1,200, including 500 children, in Kachin.

Indonesia’s Aceh sets partial curfew for women

Indonesia’s Aceh sets partial curfew for women

Aceh officials imposed a partial curfew for women, saying it will reduce sexual violence; critics call it discriminatory             

The capital of Indonesia's Aceh province has imposed a partial curfew for women that it says will reduce sexual violence but which critics say is discriminatory.
Internet cafes, tourist sites, sports facilities and entertainment venues have been instructed to refuse service to women after 11 p.m. unless they are accompanied by a husband or male family member.
Women will also be barred from working in those businesses after during curfew.
Banda Aceh mayor Illiza Sa'aduddin Djamal Djamal said employing women late at night constitutes exploitation and makes them vulnerable to sexual harassment.
"We have studied the matter thoroughly and this is in line with the labor laws," Djamal said. "Our aim is to protect women employees, especially those working at entertainment spots."
Women who break the rules are to be reprimanded but businesses employing female workers after the curfew risk losing their license.
The directive also prohibits unaccompanied children from being in public places after 10 p.m.Indonesia’s Aceh sets partial curfew for women
The conservative province of Aceh is the only one of Indonesia's 34 provinces to impose Islamic law in the most populous Muslim-majority nation in the world.
The chief of Indonesia's national commission for violence against women said the measure would only restrict women's freedom and threaten their livelihoods.
"The government should stop meddling in women's affairs," said Azriana, who like many Indonesians uses only one name.
"If the intention of the Aceh government is to provide protection for women, it must instead educate the public and men to respect women or provide security at the nightspots."
Azriana said the regulation would likely see Aceh's morality police nabbing any women out after 11 p.m. and not just those in specific sectors.
Ninik Rahayu from the Indonesian Institute for Empowerment of Women and Children said that the directive is discriminatory and contrary to Indonesia's constitution. She also said the policy shows the inability of the local government to provide adequate protection for residents.
The decision comes a month after unmarried men and women were banned from riding together on a motorbike in one of Aceh's districts.
Under 2013 legislation, female passengers behind a male driver were forbidden to straddle motorbikes and required to ride sidesaddle.
Indonesia's secular central government granted Aceh the right to implement a version of Sharia in 2006 as part of a peace deal to end a separatist war. A religious police and court system have been established and the new restrictions on women further strengthen Sharia in the province.
Last year, Aceh lawmakers passed a law that punishes gay sex by public caning and subjects non-Muslims to strict interpretation of Sharia. People convicted of gambling, adultery and drinking alcohol already face caning, as do women wearing tight jeans and people who skip Friday prayers.

Myanmar ruling party concedes defeat as Suu Kyi's party heads for big win

The party of democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi claimed victory Monday in virtually every seat in four states where results of Myanmar's historic parliamentary election were known, signaling a sweep that is likely to hand it the presidency and further loosen the military's stranglehold.

The announcement at the headquarters of the National League for Democracy (NLD) set off a new round of jubilation among the party's red-shirted supporters, who already had been celebrating the result of Sunday's vote.

The NLD said it had won 44 of the 45 lower house seats and all 12 of the upper house seats from the party stronghold of Yangon, Myanmar's biggest city and former capital. It also won all 38 seats in Ayeyarwaddy state, all but one of the 40 in Bago, and 11 out of 19 lower house seats and all 10 upper house seats in Mon state. The trend was expected to continue in Myanmar's remaining 10 states.

Even without official results, it was clear that the ruling Union Solidarity Development Party was facing a rout. The party is made up former junta members who ruled the Southeast Asian country for a half-century and as a quasi-civilian government since 2011. Many of its leaders conceded personal defeats in their races.

“We lost,” Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) acting chairman Htay Oo told Reuters a day after the Southeast Asian country's first free nationwide election in a quarter of a century.

Other members of the ruling party were conceding defeat as the count continued.

Shwe Mann, speaker of the lower house of Parliament and former head of the ruling USDP, announced his defeat in a Facebook post Monday morning, as the country awaited official results of the historic polls.

The post said: “Congratulations!” to his opponent from the opposition National League for Democracy party in their central Myanmar constituency. Shwe Mann said he went to his opponent's home to convey congratulations in person at 6:30 Monday morning.

His rejection by the voters, despite his reputation as a moderate, could suggest the depth of support for the opposition NLD.

In her first comments after Sunday's elections, Suu Kyi called for the country to remain “calm, peaceful and stable” as it awaits the outcome of the election.

“There is no official result yet. But the people already know who has won,” she told her supporters outside the NLD headquarters on Monday morning.

“It doesn't matter if you win or lose, but your dignity is important. The winner should show empathy to the losers.”

Thumbnail image for Faces in the crowd at the NLD party election victory
Faces in the crowd at the NLD party election victory
Supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi celebrate the opposition party’s historic win

The NLD had thousands of monitors deployed across Myanmar during the vote, keeping track as each polling station closed and publicly announced its totals. That was expected to give NLD leaders a solid estimate of final numbers long before official totals were announced.

Suu Kyi is barred from taking the presidency herself by provisions of a constitution written by the military junta to preserve its power. The amendment bars anyone with a foreign spouse or child from holding the president's and vice presidents' positions. Suu Kyi's two sons are British, as was her late husband.

But if the NLD on its own or with allies wins more than two-thirds of the seats up for grabs and is able to form Myanmar's first democratically elected government since the early 1960s, Suu Kyi says she will be the power behind the new president regardless of a constitution she has derided as "very silly."

After the polls, the newly elected members and the military appointees will propose three candidates, and elect one as the president. The other two will become vice presidents. That vote won't be held before February.

The military is also guaranteed key ministerial posts — defense, interior and border security. The military is not under the government's control and could continue attacks against ethnic groups. But critics are most concerned about the military's constitutional right to retake direct control of government, as well as its direct and indirect control over the country's economy.

Sunday's vote was billed as the freest ever in this Southeast Asian nation, which has been run by a quasi-civilian government for the last five years in a scripted transition toward democracy. Many of the eligible 30 million voters cast ballots for the first time, including Suu Kyi, the epitome of the democracy movement.

"DAWN OF A NEW ERA. Millions vote in historic election," was the banner headline of New Light of Myanmar, a government-owned newspaper, on Monday, reflecting how much Myanmar has changed since the military gave up its half-century rule in 2011.

Although 91 parties contested, the main fight was between the NLD and the ruling Union Solidarity Development Party (USDP), made up largely of former junta members. A host of other parties from ethnic minorities, who form 40 percent of Myanmar's 52 million people, are also running.

The main concern about the election's fairness arose before the poll. Activists estimated that up to 4 million people, mostly citizens working abroad, would not be able to vote.

Religious tension, fanned by Buddhist nationalists whose actions have intimidated Myanmar's Muslim minority, also marred the election campaign. Among those excluded from voting were around a million Rohingya Muslims who are effectively stateless in their own land.

Most Rohingya Muslims live in Rakhine state, where hundreds have been killed since 2012. The United Nations says they are one of the most persecuted ethnic groups in the world. Suu Kyi campaigned in Rakhine State but avoided Rohingya areas.

Although the Sunday vote was peaceful the NLD filed an official complaint before the election commission about violations of voting regulations. There were allegations of errors in the voter list and irregularities in advance voting.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement the election was an important step forward, but added it was "far from perfect."

Important impediments remain to a fully democratic civilian government, Kerry said, "including the reservation of a large number of unelected seats for the military; the disfranchisement of groups of people who voted in previous elections, including the Rohingya; and the disqualification of candidates based on arbitrary application of citizenship and residency requirements."

Still, there was excitement among voters about the first general election since a quasi-civilian government replaced military rule in 2011, which was widely seen as a referendum on the country's unsteady reform process.

"I've done my bit for change, for the emergence of democracy," said Daw Myint, a 55-year-old former teacher, after she cast her vote for the NLD in Yangon.

Many voters doubted the military would accept the outcome of the vote if the NLD wins.

But in the capital, Naypyitaw, military Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing said there would be no repeat of the last free vote in 1990, which Suu Kyi's party won overwhelmingly. A shocked army refused to seat the winning lawmakers, with the excuse that a new constitution first had to be implemented —- a task that ended up taking 18 years amid intense international pressure. New elections were finally held in 2010, but they were boycotted by the opposition, which cited unfair election laws.

The USDP won by default and took office in 2011 under President Thein Sein, a former general who began political and economic reforms to end Myanmar's isolation and jump-start its moribund economy. The USDP's popularity, or lack of it, was again tested in a 2012 by-election in which the NLD won 43 of the 44 parliamentary seats it contested.

South Korea reports nine new MERS cases

South Korea on Saturday confirmed nine more cases of the virus that causes Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), but said it did not represent a spread of the outbreak as the infected were already in quarantine. The additional cases brought the total number of people infected with the virus to 50.

The outbreak first reported on May 20 has claimed four lives and stirred public fear as the government was blamed for an ineffective initial response that allowed one man who had returned from Saudi Arabia to infect more than half the rest.

All nine new cases were traced to the initial patient, the health ministry said, calling them health care associated infections. But the ministry said tests showed no sign of mutation in the virus that has affected the South Korean patients, with its genetic traits "almost identical" to the one that was found in the Middle East outbreak.

There has been no sustained human-to-human transmission, but the worst case scenario is the virus changes and spreads rapidly, as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) did in 2002-2003 killing about 800 people around the world.

MERS was first identified in humans in 2012 and is caused by a coronavirus from the same family as the one that triggered SARS. But MERS has a much higher death rate at 38 percent, according to World Health Organization (WHO) figures.

South Korea's new cases bring the total number globally to about 1,194, based on WHO data, with at least 443 related deaths. 

Meanwhile, Kwon Joon-wook, a senior official of the ministry, told journalists Saturday the 68-year-old man who was the first case, and his wife who contracted the virus from him, have both been cured and were released from hospital Friday. Two others were also waiting to be released, he said.

Consequently, more than 1,660 people who may have been exposed to the virus have been placed under varying levels of quarantine. The outbreak has forced hundreds of schools to shut their gates, thousands of people to cancel travel plans and dealt a blow to many businesses as people were told to avoid large crowds.

White South Korea is far from being in a state of panic, the number of face masks sold in pharmacies is said to have dramatically increased over the past week. 

"This weekend will be critical. The incubation period for primary and secondary patients ends this weekend. If there is no further infection, then we can say we have stemmed the main tide," said Choi Jae-wook, an official at the Korean Medical Association. "But if there are more cases, we will have to prepare for tertiary and fourth generation infections — and the spread into the local community."

The WHO said Friday it would send a team of experts to South Korea for a joint mission with the government in collecting information of the outbreak. The team is expected to arrive here as early as next week, the ministry said. The WHO has said it expects more infections in South Korea, while stressing there was currently "no evidence of sustained transmission in the community."

S. Korean ferry firm head sentenced over sinking

Kim Han-sik, president of Chonghaejin Marine Co., was sentenced to seven years in prison for Sewol ferry disaster

October 29, 2015 2:05AM ET

South Korea's highest court on Thursday sentenced the head of a ferry operator to seven years in prison over a ship sinking last year that killed more than 300 people.

The Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that sentenced Kim Han-sik, president of Chonghaejin Marine Co., to seven years in prison on charges including manslaughter. The court found Kim responsible for failing to prevent theoverloading of cargo and improper storage on the ship that judges said contributed to the sinking.

Four other Chonghaejin officials were sentenced to two-and-a-half to four years in prison on similar charges, the court said in a statement.

A total of 304 people died when the ferry Sewol sank off South Korea's southwest coast in April 2014 in one of the country's deadliest maritime disaster in decades. Most of the victims were teenagers from a single high school.

Divers recovered 295 bodies from the wreckage before the government stopped underwater searches last year. Nine victims remain missing.

The Supreme Court couldn't confirm when it will be able to make a verdict on Sewol captain Lee Joon-seok, who appealed after a regional high court convicted him of homicide and sentenced him to life in prison in April.

One-Child Policy Ends in China

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http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/live-news/2015/10/one-child-policy-ends-in-china.html

Court agrees to take up Philippines challenge to Beijing's maritime claims

Manila insists UN Convention on the Law of the Sea should be used to resolve the dispute

October 29, 2015 1:24PM ET Updated 10:33PM ET

China’s claims of sovereignty in the South China Sea were dealt a blow Thursday after an international tribunal ruled that it had the power to hear a case brought by the Philippines over disputed islands.

Manila has insisted the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, which the Philippines and China have both ratified, should be used to resolve the dispute, which has triggered growing international concern.

But China has refused to participate in the proceedings, arguing the tribunal — based in The Hague and known as the Permanent Court of Arbitration — had no jurisdiction over the case.

“Reviewing the claims submitted by the Philippines, the tribunal has rejected the argument” by China that the “dispute is actually about sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and therefore beyond the tribunal's jurisdiction,” the court said in a statement.

Instead, the court ruled the case reflects “disputes between the two states concerning the interpretation or application of the Convention” — something that falls within its remit.

China insists it has sovereign rights to nearly all of the South China Sea, a strategic waterway through which about a third of all the world's traded oil passes.

The disputed waters — claimed in part by Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and others — have also become the stage for a struggle for regional dominance between Beijing and Washington, the world's two largest economic and military powers.

INTERNATIONAL

JIM WATSON / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

US, 11 Pacific Rim nations reach agreement on landmark trade pact

Controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership would cover some 40 percent of the world economy

October 5, 2015 8:41AM ET

Pacific trade ministers have reached a deal on the most sweeping — and to many the most controversial — trade liberalization pact in a generation, in a move that will cut trade barriers and set common standards across the bloc, but potentially at a cost to consumers and employees, say public health advocates, environmentalists and labor groups.

INTERNATIONAL

NICOLAS ASFOURI / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

To be or not to be: The great firewall of Thailand

As one nation hatches a government plan to control the Internet, advocacy groups in Bangkok voice opposition

October 7, 2015 5:00AM ET

by Adam Ramsey

BANGKOK, Thailand — Tucked away in a coffee shop near Central Bangkok, Phannee Naksuk rushed behind her counter, sprinkling cinnamon on the foam of an iced latte that was beginning to wilt. All around, her dozen customers were stuck on smartphones or laptops, their faces illuminated in faint blue light inside the shady shop.

Japan pledges maritime security aid to Vietnam

Japan has promised Vietnam ships to strengthen its forces in the South China Sea, with the two nations describing large-scale land reclamation there as a threat to peace -- a veiled reference to China.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe also pledged on Tuesday some $835 million in infrastructure loans after holding talks with Nguyen Phu Trong, in his first visit to Japan as general secretary of Vietnam's ruling Communist Party.

Both countries are locked in separate maritime territorial disputes with an increasingly assertive China and are strengthening cooperation as a result.

Malaysia arrests suspects over Bangkok blast

Malaysia has arrested three suspects in connection with the investigation into a bomb blast in central Bangkok last month that killed 20 people, police officials said.

Two Malaysians and a Pakistani national were arrested and were assisting with the investigation, police chief Khalid Abu Bakar told reporters on Monday.

"We believe the suspects can help in the investigation ... our arrest was made to assist the Thai police in the Thai bombing investigation," he said.

Indonesia declares state of emergency over fire haze

Indonesia has declared a state of emergency in a province choked with thick haze from forest fires, as fears mount that worsening air quality could affect the upcoming Grand Prix in neighbouring Singapore.

The emergency announcement in Riau province on Sumatra island came as aircraft were deployed to water-bomb the raging blazes and conduct "cloud-seeding", which involves chemically inducing rain.

The blazes have intensified in the past fortnight, sending smog over Sumatra and Borneo that has left tens of thousands ill, forced people to wear face masks and prompted the cancellation of flights and school closures.

Although there were more fires in other provinces, Riau has been one of the worst-hit as smog blows in from the surrounding areas.

INTERNATIONAL

WILLIAM WEST / AFP / GETTY IMAGES

Malcolm Turnbull sworn in as Australia's new PM

Turnbull, the nation's fourth leader two years, assured the country that his government remained strong

September 15, 2015 2:15AM ET

Australia's former communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull, was sworn in as prime minister on Tuesday, assuring the country that his government remained strong despite an internal party revolt that made him the nation's fourth leader in little more than two years.

Australia Prime Minister Tony Abbott ousted 2:04

Al Jazeera America News | September 14, 2015

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Turnbull became Australia's 29th prime minister after a surprise ballot of his conservative Liberal Party colleagues voted 54-44 on Monday night to replace Prime Minister Tony Abbott only two years after he was elected. Turnbull's elevation has cemented a culture of disposable leaders as the new norm in Australian politics since the 11-year tenure of Prime Minister John Howard ended in 2007.

"There's been a change of prime minister, but we are a very, very strong government, a very strong country with a great potential and we will realize that potential working very hard together," Turnbull told reporters as he left his Canberra apartment on Tuesday morning.

"I'm filled with optimism and we will be setting out in the weeks ahead ... more of those foundations that will ensure our prosperity in the years ahead," Turnbull added.

Shortly before Turnbull was sworn in, a grim-faced Abbott spoke for the first time since his sudden ouster, warning that the persistent volatility in Australia's government could hurt the nation's standing on the global stage.

"Australia has a role to play in the struggles of the wider world: the cauldron of the Middle East and security in the South China Sea and elsewhere," Abbott told reporters. "I fear that none of this will be helped if the leadership instability that's plagued other countries continues to taint us."

Abbott did not say during his speech whether he will quit politics. He did say he would not destabilize the new prime minister. "There will be no wrecking, no undermining, and no sniping," Abbott told reporters.

Turnbull, a 60-year-old former journalist, lawyer and merchant banker known for his moderate views, was party leader for two years before Abbott ousted him by a single vote in a similar leadership ballot.

The Liberals were elected in 2013 as a stable alternative to the then-Labor government. Labor came to power under Kevin Rudd at elections in 2007, only to dump him for his deputy Julia Gillard in 2010 months ahead of elections. The bitterly divided and chaotic government then dumped Gillard for Rudd just months before the 2013 election.

Successive opinion polls showed that the government was likely to lose in next September's elections under Abbott's leadership. Opinion polls show that Turnbull is more popular than Abbott, but his support for environmental steps against carbon alienated some on the party's right.